Unscripted

by Swallow, Lisa

  Watching happily married couples on my almost wedding day? I can’t do this.

  I grab Audrey’s hand, and we run through the crowds, to the nearby plaza where a street performer plays an acoustic guitar and sings. Dressed in knee-length shorts and a Hawaiian shirt, he’s the first we’ve come across who isn’t an Elvis impersonator. As I approach, I catch the sound of a show song, one I performed three years ago in my first small part on Broadway. I stop.

  Good days. My Broadway career was moving from chorus to minor solo roles when I met Miles. He lived with two guys and a girl, also in the show, and I soon joined them crammed into a small apartment in Brooklyn. Our lives intertwined, and for the first time, somebody understood my dreams and ambitions. Miles and I lived and loved every day; we worked hard and succeeded where others gave up.

  After a year, Miles wanted to move to LA and try out for the network TV seasons over there. He had a friend who’d found success and wanted to do the same. I was reluctant, unsure I was ready to leave behind the career I’d built. Could I risk my new career, swapping Broadway for the uncertainty of Hollywood? Miles’s career hadn’t progressed as far as mine, and he wanted to try new directions.

  The move turned out to be better for me than for Miles. That’s where the tiny cracks between us appeared, which I ignored. I managed to score small parts in shows and moved from the silent extra in the background to a speaking part with a couple of lines. Over the next eighteen months, Miles’s failure to find any role at all shoved a wedge between us.

  Maybe that’s when it happened. Miles became scathing of the industry we’d tried to break into and switched career direction. He became involved in the indie artistic community, many who despised the commercialism in the world I continued to step up in. Our interests diverged, but we stayed together, with drunken assurances we were soul mates.

  I loved Miles with everything I had and gave him everything I could. And somehow that wasn’t enough.

  Somehow, I’m not enough.

  Shaking myself out of my reverie, I join the street performer’s rendition of “All That Jazz.” He grins and we execute a perfect choreography. Impressive for a drunk actress who could trip over her own feet at any moment. The crowd gathers to watch our performance, and money lands at our feet.

  I’m new to acting in front of crowds this close up; I never took part in street performance the way some of my London RADA colleagues would for fun, or for beer money. I catch eyes with a few in the crowd: kids holding drinks and large smiles, tourists taking photos with their phones.

  A guy heading from the direction of the Bellagio hotel entrance towards the Strip halts beneath the covered walkway when he sees our performance. Beneath the downlights, this tall guy with tousled hair draws attention, and not just from me. Girls nearer to him lose interest in the performance and the fountains, focused on the guy instead. He’s half-shadowed, preventing me picking out all his features, but he doesn’t move, looking across at me.

  Through the dark and my inebriation, I’m positive I recognise him; something in his look rings the familiarity bell. Have I come across this guy in his tailored suit at some point in my Hollywood or Broadway careers? Maybe if I’d less alcohol inside, I could focus better, but that’s not happening.

  Dozens of people around watch me, but this man’s scrutiny burns my cheeks as I dance. I keep up my performance, determined to appear oblivious to his staring. Instead, I lose focus in my attempt to remember if, and how, I know him and trip. I right myself and continue the dance, the consummate professional I am.

  One of the braver girls approaches the guy, and a taller man next to him steps closer. Aha. Bodyguard? Famous. Must be why I recognise him. I turn my back and return to the dance.

  The surreality of tonight’s reality spins in the sky above as I tip my face upwards. The heat glows against my skin and hair fans my face, cooling. In this moment, I’m lost to the freedom as I transport myself away from the world.

  Until I trip again, and this time land, unceremoniously, on my ass. The pain doesn’t register through the drunk numb, and as Audrey frowns down at me, I giggle. Billboards opposite advertise Vegas shows, and I plan a longer escape from LA. I could move here. Sing in shows again. Live away from my recent past.

  I hold up my arm, and Audrey hauls me to my feet. I steady myself on her arm. “Where are we going next?”

  3

  Walking into a new hotel in Vegas is like walking into a new town—or even world. I’ve holidayed places where tall hotels only have the chain’s branding differences, but the sprawling Vegas establishments could never be mistaken for each other. Sometimes reaching the check-in desk takes several minutes following a walk through shops or casinos. Here, one of the most expensive, I pass the groups, window-shopping designer wares and stride towards the hotel’s club with the VIP area.

  I stumble up the stairs with Audrey to the area frequented by stars and the wealthy visiting Vegas, where I promised to meet Dylan. I’ve spent “VIP time” with the band before, though not recently. I expected quiet tables surrounded by people, set wide apart, but instead I step into a small, private bar complete with dance floor and a few tables. Voices can be heard over the music; nobody dances.

  Steadying myself on the metal stair rail, I squint through the dim for the band members. Bryn steps in front of me, holding two tumbler glasses. His tall, bulky figure blocks my view, and I catch the familiar grin spreading across his face. "Aha, you managed to drag yourself off the streets then, you reprobate?"

  I poke my tongue out at the Blue Phoenix drummer. "Evening, Bryn."

  "How are you going?"

  "Oh, you know, had better days." I take one of the glasses and drink. "Ugh. Whisky." I screw my face up and hand it back.

  "I’ll get you something better." He thrusts the glasses at me and inclines his head to the back of the room, curls dropping away from his brow. "Take those; we’re over there. Still a vodka lover?"

  "You got it."

  The lights in the club disorientate me further as they sweep across the dance floor towards the table in the quieter shadows. Dylan jumps up as I approach.

  "Are you okay? You’re late."

  "Stop fussing!" I sink onto the seat next to him.

  "Hey, Liam."

  The ponytailed bass player nods in hello but doesn’t hold my look long. On the plane over here, things were awkward with him. A couple of years ago, Liam jilted a girl at the last minute on his first wedding day. Earlier today, he expressed mumbled sympathy over what happened to me this morning but said no more. Is Liam worried I’ll lash out at him for his treatment of Honey? Liam’s behaviour shocked me at the time, but I didn’t judge him.

  Half a dozen people sit around the table, a mixture of men and women. The band’s wives and girlfriends didn’t want to join us at short notice; partly because they know how the guys can behave if they’re together. The guys are 99% tamer than several years ago, but a night out with the band in Vegas won’t be a tea party.

  I’d hoped it would just be the boys and us. Thank God, Audrey’s with me because I don’t want to make small talk with strangers. Not today. Nobody introduces themselves, busy talking and unaware of my presence.

  "Did Jem change his mind?" I ask.

  "Not his scene since he sobered," Dylan replies.

  I nod. I’ve been friends with these guys since I was fifteen, when high school divided into their teenage cliques. The five of us were the weird kids on the edge; the unconventional ones who watched and quietly mocked our sheep-like school friends.

  In the early days, I needed to move past the “girl hanging out with boys” thing, and overcome some two-way teen crushes. Jem’s mysterious persona fed into my desire for an edgy outsider, and as Dylan grew from skinny, quiet kid to hot as hell guy, I fought my hormones.

  I kissed Dylan.

  Once.

  Curiosity, fuelled by a night hanging out in the park with the guys and bottles of cheap cider, ended in drunken disaster. I did
n’t keep my mouth on Dylan’s long enough to discover if his kissing was any good, and the regret was instant by both parties. My fear of losing the other guys’ friendship by adding an awkward element to the group compounded how I felt. I didn’t want to lose my best friends. Any of them.

  Besides, Dylan Morgan may be godlike and beyond comparison to some, but he’s not my kind of guy. Too intense; always was. Brooding? More like he sulks and people put up with the behaviour because he’s ridiculously hot and famous. If he needs pulling down to earth, I’m your girl.

  I look at Dylan now, the one band member who’s allowed me closest. Jem pushed me away, I thought at first because I kissed Dylan, but he withdrew from the world too. The other guys? Mates, a closeness from our teen bonds I’ll never lose.

  Twelve years, and I still love them all to death.

  I saw Blue Phoenix form and grow, and my four skinny, seventeen-year-old friends’ determination to make a career in music spurred my own. The guys refused to accept the scoffing they’d never make a career in music.

  As they began to prove people wrong, the possibility I could find a place at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts in London was no longer a distant dream. I took singing and acting lessons, performed in every school and amateur dramatic performance I could over three years. Competition to gain a place at RADA meant a lot of disappointed kids each year. I succeeded.

  Bryn returns with drinks he sets down in front of Audrey and me. "Saw you on TV, Myfanwy."

  I wrinkle my nose at him using my full name, but the Welsh lilt reminds me of home—and of the dozen or so people from Wales who attended my farcical wedding today.

  "Which show?"

  "Oh, listen to her!" He says and nudges Liam. "Star of stage and screen."

  "I’ve been an extra in a few shows."

  "Oh..." He pokes his tongue into a cheek. "Um. I think you were in that vampire show. For about thirty seconds. Died horribly."

  Liam snorts into his drink "Nice, Bryn."

  "I know which one you mean. I just missed out on one of the lead roles in that. A role where I didn’t die horribly." I share their smile and fill a nearby champagne glass. Strange how my vodka glass emptied so quick.

  "You’ll land a big role soon," says Bryn. "You’re an amazing actress."

  "Her singing and dancing are pretty special too." I look across the table, focusing on the source of the smooth, amused voice. Refined English accent. Grey shirt, top few buttons undone and eyes crinkling at the corners as he smiles at me.

  Pieces click in my head. I should’ve recognised the man from earlier, considering how well I once knew Tate Daniels. If he’d been closer, and I’d not been spinning around in circles, I probably would.

  Tate Daniels, the guy who wanted to break my heart years before Miles ever did.

  We attended RADA together, him in the year above me and already lapping up attention. He gained public attention, a couple of years after graduation when he scored a role on Norsemen. His often shirtless, ripped body caused a sudden and intense popularity amongst the female demographic, and I’m pretty sure their interest in the show wasn’t the historical detail.

  The lucky guy went from obscurity to a leading role and accompanying fame, within a few short weeks.

  Tate laps up every opportunity brought about by his new life. I’ve lost count of the number of actresses he’s spent time attached to, including one or two older than him, and more than one co-star. His infamy gathers at a pace to match his fame. In recent months, there’s been more than one drug-fuelled escapade resulting in him sprawled across the internet. Talk about PR nightmare. If I’m ever lucky enough to attain the level of success he has, I won’t risk a long-term career for short-term hedonism.

  Instead of a returned smile from me, Tate receives a squint through the dark as I confirm the guy is him. He pulls a squinting face in return, and I catch his smile curve further beneath the dim lights. Ah yes, the Tate Daniels smile, teasing the female sex into imagining he’s having inappropriate thoughts about them. Add his gym-honed body and equally famous cerulean blue eyes, and he has the complete package most women would love to tear open.

  "Have you seen Myf dying horribly too, Tate?" asks Bryn.

  "She was performing outside the Palazzo a couple of hours ago. I was impressed by how good she is. Well, until she landed on her ass."

  I squint again. The girl beside him cosies up, arm on Tate’s shoulder, and pouts at me. Nice, Tate. Flirt with another girl in front of your date. Nothing changes. Tate always loved beautiful girls focusing their attention on him, and they’re interchangeable as the mood takes him. This one’s tall and skinny, heavily made up as if she’s come from a performance earlier tonight. Dancer? I flick my gaze from Tate to the high-maintenance girl next to him. Beautiful girl, beautiful man.

  "Hello, Tate," I say.

  He nods. "Evening, Myf."

  The pain of my recent past retreats to a distance for a fleeting moment as his unwavering gaze remains on me. Tate was once everything I loved and hated in a man, the extraordinary and ambitious guy whose talent put him at the top of his game as he trampled over others to get there. The intensity that always existed between us remains, hidden by pleasantries.

  I once starred opposite him in a stage play and fought against the temptation to follow the onstage romance to his bed. He was bloody persistent at the time, but the guy always liked a challenge and almost succeeded. Almost.

  Does he know what happened to me today?

  "Which of the band dressed up as Elvis and stood outside the Venetian, the first time we came to Vegas?" interrupts Liam. "Made about ten bucks from half an hour’s busking work."

  "Me. That was the early days. Now I don’t get out of bed for less than a million." Dylan chuckles.

  "What were you singing?" I ask. A young Dylan standing in the Vegas heat disguised as Elvis? I bite back a laugh. "I wish I’d seen that."

  "Can’t remember," he replies.

  "Should’ve volunteered your Elvis services at a wedding chapel, Dylan," says the girl in the shadows with Tate.

  The conversation dries at that word.

  Wedding.

  I slug the champagne, neck prickling at the meaning behind the silence, then stand. "Do they serve cocktails here?"

  "Yeah. What do you want?" asks Dylan and stands too.

  I stride ahead of Dylan and make a beeline to the small bar. A man dressed in a hotel uniform looks up from his glass polishing. Behind him rows of bottles line shelves, some spirits I recognise, others not. I side glance a woman next to me with a goldfish bowl sized orange and red layered cocktail.

  "I drank a good cocktail before at the hotel bar. Called...Hmm. Don’t remember. Pink." The bar man looks expectantly at us, and I describe the drink to him. To my delight, the exact one I want appears in front of me, complete with strawberries, and the rim dusted with pink sugar.

  Dylan orders a drink too and rests against the bar as he watches my “enthusiastic” drinking. "How are you?"

  "Drunk."

  "But how are you after what happened today?"

  "Not drunk enough." He opens his mouth to say something, and I interrupt, "No lectures from you about using alcohol to cope, Mr Morgan."

  "Wasn’t gonna. Just glad you’re here and not rolling around in the streets. What took you so long?"

  "I was with Audrey. Enjoying myself."

  "Yeah, a great companion. I think she’s drunker than you are."

  "We’re having fun, Dylan." I wipe the sugar from my mouth. "A few drinks, a meal to line my stomach in preparation for more, and then a sing and dance by the fountains." I demonstrate some of my moves from earlier. I’m used to dancing in heels, but not when the room’s unstable... my left foot slides. "Oops. Slippery floor."

  "Sure, Myf." He catches my elbow.

  I rest against the bar and nudge Dylan in the ribs. He angles his body to face me. "How are—"

  "Don’t you dare ask how I am again." I bite into the alcoho
l-soaked fruit. Hmm, nice. I might always eat strawberries prepared like this.

  I stare at Tate’s back. I’ve met the guy maybe three times since he left London for the US. The final time our paths crossed was when Liam and the actress Honey were engaged. Tate moved in her circle and became friends with the band. Now the “Liam and Honey show” is over, Tate’s less likely to score invites to Blue Phoenix social events.

  To be honest, recently you need to have a child to be involved in any Blue Phoenix social affairs; the band are procreating that quickly.

  "How’s the family?" I ask.

  Dylan’s eyes shine, as he retreats to thoughts of Sky and his son. "Better. Much better."

  "Rhys will be a heartbreaker." The toddler wins over everybody who meets him, the blonde curls and blue eyes the perfect mix of his parents. Rhys’s exuberance can’t fail to charm people, the boy full of laughter and mischief.

  "Sure is." He nudges me. "Like his dad, huh?"

  I shake my head in mock despair. Something unspoken lies between us, a situation we’ve never spoken about before. Sky became unwell—really unwell—after Rhys’s birth, and Dylan was left to cope without her for a few weeks. I listened over the phone as he broke down about his situation, my heart rent by our physical distance.

  I still hold guilt that I never returned to the UK to help him.

  Throughout his ride on the fame crazy-train, Dylan’s contacted me when he needs to talk. The band are his family nowadays, and as an honorary member of the group, I’m the outsider’s voice he needs. I speak my mind but never judge.

  The events last year were hard. I’d never heard Dylan hurting that bad since his mother died. On vacation in South America with Miles at the time, I swung between heading to the UK and staying with Miles. Miles indicated he didn’t want me to go, pointing out Dylan had enough people around to help him. Now I wish I’d returned. I was a shit friend at the worst time.

  "I’m sorry about not being there, Dylan," I say in a soft voice. "I wanted to help."

  "I understand that. I asked you not to." He wraps an arm around my shoulders. "You’ve been there for me plenty of times. It’s all good."