“We’ve got ourselves a serious situation here, sweetheart. I need you to get your ass into this office immediately, got it?” There’s worriedness to his tone. He so seldom sounds alarmed that when he does, it piques my interest.
“Did someone croak?”
“No, but something came up that we need to address before it flatlines your career.”
I laugh. “Calm down. If it’s a naked picture of me, it’s fake.”
He doesn’t do the same. “I’d rather not discuss this on the phone. Get here when you can,” he replies and hangs up.
I’m so not in the mood, I think as I slip into my dress and embark on a very long walk of shame.
❄ ❄ ❄
“What’s the problem?” I ask as I stroll into Lawrence’s office.
He slams a copy of today’s Daily Post onto his desk. “Open it to page thirteen.”
I flip through the paper until I reach the thirteenth page, where I find a huge photo of Payton and me in the alley behind the Hilton. I’ve got my arms wrapped around her neck, and she’s kissing me while dipping me backward as though we’d been dancing in the moonlight. It’s actually a really beautiful picture of us—or it would be a beautiful picture, if it weren’t printed in the gossip section of some second-rate national newspaper with the caption “Kendall Bettencourt Celebrates Awards Nod with Lesbian Lip Lock” slapped across the top of it.
Who took this picture? I didn’t see anyone around us! Get real, Kendall. Like you were paying attention to what was going on around you! It doesn’t matter anyway. You’re busted. Oh my god, Dad saw it! Which means Mom also saw it! I have a shit load of either lying or explaining to do. Okay, stay composed. One thing at a time. “I see the problem here. The page eight column is on page thirteen. That’s confusing. We should definitely notify someone about that.”
“That isn’t funny, Kendall! How am I supposed to spin this to the press? ‘She was so drunk that she stumbled into a poorly lit back alley, tripped over her own feet and collided lips-first with her friend?’ Tell me what you want me to say! Illuminate me in ten words or less, because that’s all you can get when it comes to the short attention span of the media!” he yells then takes a seat on the corner of his desk and folds his arms.
Oh no, he did not yell at me. “Okay, you incredible asshole! Here it is, in ten words or less!” I shout and count the words on my fingers. “I think I’m in love with her. Is that clear and direct enough for you, or do you need a complete oral history of where, when, and how it happened?”
“No, that will do,” he says, his tone suddenly and surprisingly sympathetic. He taps his fingers on the glass desktop. I can practically see the cogs of his brain turning in time with his drumming. “I wish you would’ve told me about this sooner. Now we have to do damage control. ‘Kendall Bettencourt, the Lesbian’ is such a salacious gossip column headline. We are in for a shit storm of media hassle.”
“Christ!” I manically flail my hands in his face. “You’re so focused on the ‘lesbian’ thing. You’re totally missing the ‘I think I’m in love’ thing! Why does the label matter? Why can’t I just be a girl in love?”
“Because you’re not just a girl at all!” He sighs. “Listen. I know you’re young. You’re falling in love, and you feel like you’re on top of the world because of it. If you were any other kid in America, you’d be able to be a girl who happens to be in love with another girl and remain gleefully invulnerable to anyone’s opinion. But you are not the average kid, Kendall. You live in the limelight! You are universally adored and looked up to! Every decision you make will be analyzed whether you like it or not, and it’s possible that the opinions of others can hurt you. You have to think about Payton in all of this, as well. She’s going to be subjected to the same kind of unpleasant attention that you will be: the paparazzi, the incessant hassle of reporters, the celebrity stalkers.”
“You’re a little late to the party, Lawrence! I’ve already thought about all of that—what it could mean for my career to live my life out in the open, what it could do to Payton to have her every move publicly examined.” All I’ve ever wanted to do is give our relationship a chance—on my own terms, without anyone’s intrusion. But now, intrusion is inevitable, isn’t it?
And then, like an idiot, I start to cry. “I don’t hold Payton’s hand when we’re walking down the street. She isn’t the person by my side on the red carpet. We hardly ever leave the house because I know we’d be hounded by the media, and I don’t want to lie about who she is and what she means to me, but I’m scared to tell the truth! I’m caught between a rock and a hard place. I feel guilty because I’m not being honest and ashamed because I don’t think I can be honest! The whole planet wants me to be someone I’m not. Some days I feel like I’d rather rip my own heart out with a pair of pliers than live up to these stupid standards.”
“Calm down and listen to me.” He hands me a box of tissues. “If you want to be out, be out. I can’t say for sure what the reaction would be should you decide that’s what you want to do. Maybe you’d become some kind of champion for the gay community, or maybe it would become very difficult for you to get the straight romantic lead. Either way, we’ll make it work. But you must be prepared to deal with anything.”
“There’s the problem. I’m not prepared to deal with anything. I haven’t even told my parents yet.” My tears rage on, assailing my cheeks with a searing vengeance. “God! If I were a drug addict or an alcoholic that would be fine! People could get over that. But because I’m a lesbian, I’m gonna have to deal with relentless backlash? This world is so screwed up!”
“I agree, it is,” he says then places his hands firmly on both of my shoulders. “I think you need to have a talk with your parents. That’s the first step in the right direction. Go home, call them up, and tell them the truth; if anyone deserves that, it’s them. We’ll formulate a plan from there, depending on how it goes over.” He gets up to walk me out and unexpectedly folds me into a hug. I’ve never let him hug me before, but it’s kind of nice to know I’ve got someone on my side. “Let me know how it goes and keep in mind I’m behind you 100 percent, no matter what happens.”
“Yeah, okay,” I say and hurry through the door.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Payton
I get home from the longest day of classes ever, and the first thing I see is Kendall slumped over the kitchen island with her head in her hands. Initially I think she has a hangover. Every single muscle in my body is stinging from dehydration, and she’s always been such a lightweight that I can’t imagine how much worse she must be feeling after polishing off a bottle of bubbly on her own. After gently dropping my messenger bag on the floor and sneaking up behind her with the intention of giving her a back rub, I realize that it’s not a hangover we’re dealing with at all. I barely get my hand on her shoulder before she straightens up in her chair. She doesn’t quite push me away, but I notice her balk a little at the contact.
“Okay, tell me what’s up.”
She spins the chair around to face me. My breath catches at the sight of her face—not in the good kind of way. The whites of her eyes are bloodshot, as though every last capillary in them has burst. The skin beneath her nostrils is red and raw like it gets when she’s sick and has to blow her nose constantly. Without fail, Kendall has gotten sick every winter for as long as I’ve known her—usually with the flu and generally around this time in early March. Every winter she’d miss school for a week. Every day of that week, I’d bring her chicken soup my mom helped me make and the classwork she’d missed that day. I’d try to teach her the day’s math lesson so she wouldn’t fall behind. She was never particularly good at math. Of course, I never told her that.
This is different though. She hasn’t been coughing or sneezing—not once. It scares me. I know how to deal with the flu, but I don’t know how to deal with whatever this is. “Really, what’s going on?”
“The Daily Post outed me,” she says matter-of-factly.
“I thought for sure you’d have heard by now.”
“No, I hadn’t heard,” I reply, genuinely taken-aback. “You know, because none of our friends actually care about what’s going on in the world, and my mom prefers papers that print news as opposed to useless gossip.”
“My mom has definitely heard.” She grabs her phone and plays the voicemail on speakerphone mode.
Mrs. Bettencourt’s voice seethes through the handset; it is so irate—so forceful—it literally echoes throughout the kitchen, encasing us in high definition surround-sound. “That is it, Kendall! I’ve questioned a number of the decisions Lawrence has made for you in the past, but this takes the cake! This is the worst possible publicity stunt that man could have concocted! First you play gay in a film, and now he’s manipulated you into playing gay in your everyday life to ensure that film makes money? How could you let yourself go along with that? We raised you to have such integrity! I cannot believe…” The message cuts off.
“I’ve been avoiding her all day,” Kendall says. “I’m not exactly eager to have this conversation with her.”
“I can imagine,” I say kind of sourly. That isn’t a message I would’ve liked to receive. “Call your mom back and put it on speaker. I’m here now. I’ll help you through it.”
She takes a measured breath as she punches the speed dial for ‘home.’
“Hello?” Mr. Bettencourt answers.
Kendall’s lips creep into a small, somewhat serene smirk. She replies with a delicate, “Hi, Dad.”
“Hi, Pumpkin. Had a rough day, huh?” he queries, his tone amazingly unruffled.
“It’s about to get worse. I need to talk to Mom. Is she there?”
“She is. But let me ask you something before I hand the phone over to her.”
“Sure.”
For a second, we hear rustling on the line—the sound of a palm covering the mouthpiece, followed by a few muffled, indecipherable words. Then Mr. Bettencourt’s voice returns clear as day. “Your mother couldn’t see it, Kendall, looking at that picture, but I could; you girls love each other very much, don’t you?”
“Yeah, Dad. We do.”
If this moment were less horrible for Kendall, I’d just about jump for joy. That was the first time I’ve heard her reference me and love in the same sentence.
“I think that’s wonderful.” The sincerity in his voice is unquestionable. After a beat, he continues, “hold on. Here’s Mom.”
A lone, bitter snicker leaks out of Kendall. “At least my dad is cool,” she says to me. I sit down in the bar stool next to her and instinctively grab hold of her hand.
“I was beginning to think you weren’t going to call me back,” Mrs. Bettencourt declares. She doesn’t sound angry anymore. Her voice is as neutral as a robot’s, completely devoid of emotion.
“I didn’t want to call you back. I know you aren’t going to like what I have to tell you, but I need you to really listen to me and not gloss it over like you do with everything else you don’t wanna hear.”
“All right, I’m listening. Say what you have to say.”
“Lawrence didn’t concoct this. No one did. It’s not a PR stunt. I’m not playing gay for publicity. I am gay. In real life.”
Mrs. Bettencourt remains wordless for longer than I’ve ever experienced. Anyone who has ever met this woman knows how easily she can talk your ear off. That’s what makes her silence so daunting, so much more painful than a thousand obscenities.
“I don’t know how to respond to that,” Mrs. Bettencourt mutters finally.
Kendall blinks hard and fast in a brave last stand against the tears brimming in her eyes. I squeeze her hand a little tighter. Ultimately, she loses her battle. “You need me to tell you how to respond? Okay, Mom. Respond by telling me that this doesn’t change anything and that you still love me.”
“Of course I still love you, Kendall, but it does change things. I don’t understand where this is coming from. You’ve never had any of those tendencies before. You’ve had boyfriends in the past. You probably haven’t met the right man yet.”
Kendall groans. “Yes, I’ve had boyfriends in the past—a ton of them! But it never felt right with any of them. I had to force myself to connect with all of them. It never happened on its own. And really? I haven’t had any tendencies? I spent every waking hour of my life with Payton. That should have been your first clue. That should’ve been my first clue!”
“I knew this was about Payton! Honey, she is your best friend. There is a fine line between platonic and romantic love, and it’s easy to mistake one for the other. Maybe the fact that she is gay has confused you. I don’t think you should reject the possibility that you could fall in love with a man someday.”
Kendall’s cheeks color with exasperation. “I know the difference between loving someone as a friend and being in love with someone, thank you. And this isn’t about Payton. This is about me. Even if Payton weren’t in my life, even if I had never met her, I would still be gay. I finally get that.”
“No, I don’t think you do ‘get’ the gravity of this decision. You don’t seem to comprehend what a risk you’re taking by living this way. It’s hard enough for the average person to lead a gay lifestyle, but you’re a public figure!”
Sheer repugnance flares across Kendall’s face. She’s clearly trying so hard to keep her temper under control, but I fear she’s been pushed beyond her boiling point. Her rage is slated for a volcanic eruption of monumental proportions. I feel like a citizen of Pompeii, helpless against a fuming Mount Vesuvius. “Decision! Lifestyle!” she shouts. “Like I had a choice! Do you really think I woke up one day and said to myself ‘I’d like my life to be more difficult than necessary, how can I make that happen? I know! I’ll become a lesbian! That’s sure to complicate the hell out of everything!’ That’s not what happened, Mom! I didn’t decide to be gay. It’s the luck of the draw, okay? I was dealt these cards, so I’m gonna have to play my hand.”
“I don’t accept that, Kendall!” Mrs. Bettencourt fires back. “There is always a choice. Unfortunately, I can’t make your choices for you, because legally you are an adult. I can tell you if it were up to me, this thing between you and Payton would not be happening. You claim it has nothing to do with her, but it clearly has everything to do with her! She’s a bad influence on you! You were normal before you found out she was that way.”
“Mom, you’re being crazy!”
“I am not crazy, I am right! You know what? Do whatever you want, but I suggest you keep your affairs private. People in this country have an aversion to homosexuality, and those same people are the ones lining up to see your films.”
“Those people are called homophobes,” Kendall snipes. “Sounds to me like you fit right into that camp, so let me suggest something to you—keep lining up to see my films, because that’s the only way you’ll be seeing me at all from now on. And by the way, I’m still normal. So is every other gay person on this god-forsaken rock of a planet!” She ends the call and slams the Blackberry against the counter so hard that the screen cracks. “Damn it! Now I need a new phone and a new mom—too bad I can’t go out and buy both!” she yells. It’s an act though. I can see right through it. She’s not half as heated as she is hurt.
“I’m so sorry.” It’s the weakest thing in the world, but it’s pretty much the best I can do. I’m too caught up in being thankful for my own amazingly accepting mother to even know how to begin to console Kendall. I’m totally stunned at the level of Mrs. Bettencourt’s hardheartedness. I knew she wouldn’t be ecstatic about it, but I never imagined she would react with such concentrated ugliness.
“What if she’s right?” Kendall asks. “Lawrence said it, too. What if I come out and people start hating me? That means I become a liability rather than an asset as far as the studios are concerned. And that means there’s a chance I might not be considered for a lot of the roles I’d like to play. I’ve worked so hard to get where I am, and I could lose it all because of thi
s one small part of who I am. But my career isn’t even the main thing I’m worried about; I’m worried about you. You’ll never be able to escape the attention. Every time you leave the house someone will be in your face with a camera and a microphone. I don’t want that for you.”
I already know what the press is like. Between showing up to big events with Lauren and just being around Kendall, I understand what it means to be famous. The media can haunt me until my dying breath, for all I care. It would be worth it if it meant Kendall and I could be together without having to creep off into alleyways or duck into dark corners. Nevertheless, there’s no denying that her reservations are justified. But it’s a bit late to be thinking this over now, isn’t it? There’s a two-page spread of us making out in the Daily Post, for crying out loud. How can that be explained away?
“Don’t worry about me. I can handle the hype. You are the key player in this; none of this is fair to you at all. You should be allowed to take as much time as you need to come to terms with who you are. But the story seems to have broken wide open. I mean, there’s photographic proof floating around that you’re not quite straight. So the question is, how do you avoid being out?”
“I have no idea,” she laments.
Neither do I. “All right.” I hand her my phone. “It’s time for Lawrence to earn that phenomenal salary you pay him.”
❄ ❄ ❄
“Can’t we just—I don’t know—say the picture is a fake or something? There are a million different editing programs capable of forging a photo!” Kendall yells then gets up to pour herself a second glass of wine.
Lawrence lets his breath out lightly into his mouthpiece. Speakerphone amplifies the sound into the wailing of gale force winds. “Regrettably, no; there is a legion of software experts who could prove the photo’s authenticity.”
Damn you, Lawrence. Why couldn’t you have said yes? “So, what are her options? How do we make this go away?”
“The only foreseeable way to make that happen is if we present this incident as a one-time deal. We can hold a press conference where we will chalk the whole thing up to a mix of alcohol and Kendall being so overcome with joy about her Ellie Nom that she shared a kiss with her oldest, closest friend. From there, she will have to redouble her public appearances with Gunner. Essentially, she’ll have to be semi-permanently attached at the hip with him in order to ‘prove her heterosexuality.’”
The Gravity Between Us (New Adult Contemporary Romance) Page 21