The Secret Life of a Dream Girl (Creative HeArts)

by Tracy Deebs

  It wasn’t a big deal when I wasn’t hanging with anyone, when I wasn’t making friends or having to look them in the eye and continually lie to them by omission. But now that Keegan and I are getting to be close, it feels wrong not to tell him the truth.

  What am I supposed to do, though? Say, by the way, not only am I emancipated, but I’m also a huge pop star? And I’m in the middle of trying to reinvent myself? Trying to decide what I want and how I want to go about getting it?

  There’s no way I can tell him that. Especially not when I’m at a school where nearly everyone is dying to be famous. Just look at Finn and what he’s going through. So many people want to be his friend just because he’s Mia McCain’s son. I’ve spent what feels like my whole life going through that—people wanting to meet me, wanting to hang with me, wanting something from me all the time. Is it so wrong that I just want a little peace for a while?

  And it’s not that I think Keegan would blab to the world if he knew. Not with that whole good, upstanding guy thing he’s got going on. But I don’t want him to look me at me differently, either. And I definitely don’t want him to treat me differently. Even if he says he won’t. Even if he says it doesn’t matter…he won’t be able to help himself. It happens all the time.

  I just wish I knew what to do, wish I had a crystal ball that told me how I’m supposed to handle this. Especially when I don’t want to lose Keegan’s friendship. The more time I spend around him, the more I want to spend.

  I like him. I really like him, and I don’t want to lose that just because he finds out who I am. But I don’t want to keep lying to him, either, so… Ugh. Why did I think I wanted to join the real world again? Maybe there’s something to be said for living the insular life of a pop star…at least then I didn’t have to worry about actual human relationships.

  At least then I knew I was going to be screwed over.

  The last poet finishes performing, and I turn to Keegan and whisper, “What do you think I should score him?”

  “I don’t know. Nine point seven? Nine point eight?”

  I decide on the nine point eight because I feel bad that I was so caught up in my own head that I didn’t even listen to his poem. Keegan doesn’t say anything, but he’s got a strange look on his face as we wait for the scores to be tallied and the night’s winners to be announced.

  When Nick wins, we cheer along with the rest of the crowd, but something feels weird between us suddenly. Off.

  I tell myself that I’m imagining things, that it’s just because I’m feeling odd, but I don’t know if that’s true. And when we start to walk to the car—after congratulating Nick and the two runners-up—I figure out pretty quickly that I’m not imagining things.

  Keegan is polite and solicitous—I’m beginning to think it would take some kind of Armageddon-like crisis to make him behave otherwise—but he’s definitely standoffish. Not that I expect him to hold my hand or anything. I get that we’re just friends, obviously, since we spent lunch scheming on how he can win Dream Girl’s heart. But still, it had felt kind of nice in there to rest against him. To have him hold my hand in his. It’s been a long time since anyone has touched me in any but the most casual of ways, and until tonight, I hadn’t even realized that I missed it.

  I just wish I knew what he was thinking, wish I knew what I’d done wrong.

  “I’m sorry if you didn’t have a good time,” he finally says as he holds the car door open for me.

  I look at him, startled. “What do you mean? I had a great time. The poetry was amazing.”

  He searches my face for a second, his green eyes more dull than I’ve ever seen them. I stare back at him, trying to communicate just how sincere I am. “Yeah?” he finally asks.

  “Yes, of course! Why would you think otherwise?”

  “I don’t know. You just seemed a little far away during the second half. I thought maybe you were bored.”

  “No! I wasn’t bored. I was just…” What do I say here? How much do I reveal? I have to admit after spending most of my life around guys who rarely—if ever—paid attention to how I was feeling, it’s kind of nice to spend time with someone who notices everything about me.

  “Just…” he prompts when I stay frozen for too long.

  “I don’t think a lot about the whole emancipation thing. It is what it is, you know? But sometimes when it comes up, it makes me think about my life and how I got where I am.” Okay, not precisely the truth, but not not the truth, either. It’s a fine line, and I’m walking it as best I can here—at least until I figure out just how much I want to tell Keegan, or anyone, about who I really am.

  The one thing I do know, though, is that I don’t want Keegan to think that he’s to blame for any of what I’m feeling. “If I was preoccupied in there, it’s because of that. Not because I’m not having a good time with you, because I totally am.” I smile brightly in an effort to prove that I mean what I say.

  For long seconds, he doesn’t say anything. Just kind of looks at me, studies me. But then he’s smiling, too, and gesturing for me to get in the car. This time I do as he bids.

  Once he’s settled in the driver’s seat, he says, “So, do you need to get home to finish your econ homework? Or can we grab something to eat first?”

  I know what I should say—which is, obviously, econ homework. And English homework. But what I should say and what I’m going to say are two very different things. After all, how many dates with Keegan am I going to get? Soon enough he’ll have gotten Dream Girl’s attention and once he does, I’m pretty sure she’s the one he’s going to be inviting to poetry slams and late-night dinners.

  “Actually, I’d love to get some food. I’m starving.”

  “Cool. Anything particular you’re in the mood for?” He pulls out of the parking spot.

  I think about it, but the truth is I couldn’t care less what we eat as long as I get to sit across the table from Keegan while we do it. “Not really. You choose.”

  “All right.” He grins at me. “I will.”

  We make a few turns, cruise through downtown Austin. We pass some places I recognize, but I’ve been so busy with school and hiding out since I moved here that I haven’t learned the city the way I should, so I can’t even begin to guess where we might be going. At least not until he pulls into a parking lot and I spot a very distinctive red circle with a blue bar running across it.

  “We’re going to Waterloo Records?” I ask, surprised.

  “Actually, we’re going next door to 24 Diner. But we can stop into Waterloo for a little, if you want.”

  I do want, actually. I came through here on a press tour a couple years ago, before my first album really took off. I liked the place, and had wanted to spend some time just looking around it, but we’d been on a tight schedule and my dad and my manager had rushed me in and out.

  I’m not sure why I haven’t been back since I moved to Austin. I told myself it was because I was afraid of being recognized, but maybe that isn’t the truth. Maybe the real reason I haven’t been back is because I’ve been so busy hiding that I’ve forgotten why I did any of this—because I want a chance to figure out who I am.

  Beyond Cherry, beyond my dad’s ambition for me and my manager’s vision of what my career should look like.

  Beyond the perfect little pop star I tried so hard to be.

  Beyond the girl who was trapped in a life she wasn’t sure she wanted, a life she wasn’t sure would ever fit her as well as everyone else wanted it to.

  I broke out. I did all the difficult stuff, did what had to be done to get myself my freedom. And then I came here and put myself in another kind of box. Another kind of prison. One where I’m too scared of being who I was that I totally forgot about being who I am.

  God. I’m an idiot. Even worse, I’m a coward.

  The realization shames me as much as it pisses me off. I’m telling Keegan to be brave, telling him to just go for it with Dream Girl, when the whole time I’m too scared to do anythi
ng. Scared to be anyone other than this shell of a girl. This shell of the person I want to be.

  Screw that.

  I already stretched my boundaries once this week by making friends with Keegan. Tonight it’s time to do it again.

  “I do want to go!” I tell him as I bound out of the car and head for Waterloo.

  “Hey, wait for me,” he says as he jumps out of the driver’s side and hurries to catch up.

  “Time and music wait for no man.” I grab his hand and drag him toward the entrance.

  He comes without a protest. “Isn’t that tide? Time and tide wait for no man? It’s from Chaucer.”

  “Of course you actually know who said it.” I roll my eyes at him. “I was taking artistic license. You know, since I’m a songwriter and everything.”

  “And I was just keeping you honest. Being a boring business guy and all.” He grins at me.

  I don’t grin back, not when his words hit so close to what I was thinking about earlier. “Sometimes you can be honest without telling the truth, you know.”

  His smile fades, but he just nods. “Sometimes you can.”

  I put it aside. I put it all aside, determined to have the rest of the night with him because—let’s be for real—things will fall apart soon enough. They always do.

  “That’s enough deep philosophy for one night,” I tell him as I pull open the door to the music store. “Unless it’s coming from an album.”

  Walking into Waterloo is like walking into the past, when record sales were so much more personal than a click and a download. The windows are lined with album posters, old-fashioned globe lights hang from the ceiling, and you can’t go more than a couple feet without bumping into a wire carousel filled with CDs or T-shirts or bumper stickers. Old-time shoulder-height wood shelves make long row after long row throughout the store and house every distinction of music a person could think to ask for.

  The walls are covered with record covers old and new—everything from Aerosmith to Bastille, from Nirvana to Coldplay. There’s a whole section devoted to listening. Another section devoted to vinyl. And yet another section lined with pictures of everyone who’s played in-store since they opened.

  My picture should be on that wall, and for a moment, just a moment, I think about wandering over there to check it out. Just to see how much things have changed for me—these days there’s no way I could do an appearance at a store this size. There’d be a riot within five minutes, people packing the place far beyond fire code limits while crowds of fans freaked out on the sidewalk as they tried to shove their way in to get their album/shirt/merchandise/body part signed.

  Just the idea of it is insanity, especially since I’ve been away from it for two months. When you’re in the eye of the hurricane, everything seems normal. Like it’s the way things should be. It’s only when you step outside of the storm for a while, when you’re on the outskirts looking in, that you see how crazy it all is. If you survive being battered by the hundred-mile-an-hour winds, that is…

  I start to head that way, but then I notice the three middle school girls standing there looking at the photos, phones in hand as they take Snapchats against the background. I very deliberately turn away from the wall of pictures. I know I look different, but still. The last thing I need is to show up in the background of some Snapchat or Vine that gets saved and put on Tumblr. If that happens, it wouldn’t take long for the whole house of cards I’ve built here in Austin to come tumbling down, and I’m just not ready for that. Ducking the paparazzi is hard enough. The last thing I need is to be trying to duck fans, too.

  With that thought in mind, I make my way over to the listening section instead. I poke around a little and am totally thrilled when I realize that each station is set up with a selection of different albums.

  And it’s not by type, either. Each pair of headphones is attached to a total mishmash of music—an old R&B album mixed with a modern pop album, a disco album, and a country album. Or a new rap album at the same station as a quiet singer/songwriter album and an epic rock album. And of course, each one has room to house a CD of the listener’s choice—part of the store’s amazing coolness is that you can listen to any album you want before you buy it. Any album at all, even if it’s not in the listening cue. Even if it’s not one of the popular ones.

  I pick a pair of headphones dedicated to recent or coming in-store appearances. I start with Hayes Carll, whom I’ve been a fan of for years. Originally billed as a country musician, he’s recently gone more blues/folk, but I haven’t had a chance to listen to his new stuff. I pull up “Sake of the Song” first, and chills go down my spine at the first notes.

  Keegan’s in the booth next to mine, listening to something that’s put a smile on his face. I smile back, grooving in as mellow a way as I can as I listen to Hayes. I love, love, love his sound. It’s not my sound—not as Cherry the pop artist or Dahlia the singer/songwriter—but it gets deep inside me anyway. Dark, smooth, mesmerizing.

  The next song comes on, this one “32 Flavors” from Ani DiFranco, and the song is crazy. Infectious. Brilliant. I’ve never heard it before, so I listen through once before gesturing for Keegan to come closer.

  He does, right away, and I pull the headphones off my ears and hold them up to him. “Listen,” I tell him as I hit replay on the song.

  I expect him to put the headphones on, but he just holds one side up to his ear even as he beckons me closer. I do as he asks, then lift my hand to his. My goal is to help hold the headphones, but what actually happens is my hand rests over his, my palm to the back of his hand. Our fingers slide against each other’s, once, twice, before tangling together and squeezing tight.

  We listen to the whole song that way. Heads close together, eyes locked. Breaths mingling.

  He smells like cinnamon, warm and sweet and inviting. I take a deep breath, pull the scent deep inside me. Hold it in as long as I can. Then I sway to the beat of the music, closer, closer, closer, and still he doesn’t look away.

  Instead he just watches me with eyes bright as fireworks as Ani sings the chorus one last time.

  I expect him to pull away when the song ends, to go back to his listening booth. But he doesn’t move. Instead, he stays right where he is—just a little too close—for several long, breathless seconds.

  I should pull away, should drop my hand, should move back. My mind is screaming at me to do just that, to remember Dream Girl. But my body isn’t listening. How can it when every cell I have is straining toward him? When every particle of my being wants to melt into his?

  He leans forward then, drops his head down, and for a moment—just a moment—I’m certain that he’s going to kiss me. But just as I’m holding my breath, just as he’s sliding his hand up my arm, “Suck My Kiss” from the Red Hot Chili Peppers starts blaring through the house system.

  The moment shatters like dropped china—into so many pieces it would be impossible to pick them up again. Even more impossible to try to fit them back together.

  I start to laugh and so does he, the strange tension between us disappearing as suddenly as it came.

  “What do you want to listen to next?” he asks when we can finally look at each other without cracking up.

  “Actually, I want to look at their postcards over there.” I nod to one of the carousels in the far corner of the store.

  “You want to look at postcards in a record store?” But he’s putting the headphones back on their stand even as he teases me.

  “I collect them.”

  “Yeah? Any particular kind you like most?”

  “I just pick whatever I’m in the mood for at the time. But I am working on getting all the Beatles and Rolling Stones covers.”

  He looks surprised. “I didn’t peg you as old school.”

  I shoot him an amused look. “Yes, well, we’ve known each other pretty much four days. There’s a lot you don’t know about me.”

  “Is that a challenge?” he asks as he leads me over to the postcards
.

  “Maybe.” I glance up at him through my lashes. “Maybe it’s just an observation.”

  He pauses for a second and just looks at me, a little half grin on his face that makes my hands shake and my heart beat double time. Oh my God, we’re flirting. Or more like, I’m flirting and he’s not running away. That has to count for something, right?

  In the world I come from, it doesn’t count for much. I flirt with everyone—just part of the job description, or so every manager/producer/PR person I’ve ever had has told me. In that same world, I would have kissed him. I would have stepped forward, pressed my body against his, buried my hands in his shaggy blond hair, and laid one on him that would have made both our knees shake.

  But this isn’t L.A. and I’m not Cherry. I don’t have the protection of her glitter and glamour here in Austin, don’t have the sex appeal that she wears like armor. No, here I’m just me. Just plain Dahlia. And while I like just about everything that comes with being me again, I have to admit that right here, right now, I wouldn’t mind Cherry’s self-confidence. Or her irresistibility.

  “So, exactly how many Beatles covers do you have?” Keegan asks as he spins the metal rack.

  “Seven,” I answer after I swallow the unfamiliar lump in my throat.

  “Seven.” He narrows his eyes as he scans the postcards as they go by. Already I’ve spotted five Beatles ones and I’m barely looking—three that I do have and two that I don’t. “And how many albums did they make?”

  My mouth drops open then. “You mean you don’t know?”

  He laughs. “You don’t have to sound so scandalized.”

  “I am scandalized! You know so much about music. How can you not know this?”

  “Truth is, I’m not very old school. I mean, I know the big bands and the big songs, but if you want serious musical knowledge, mine starts at the eighties.”

  “I feel so betrayed.” I smile to let him know I’m just teasing.

  “Hey! I’m not on the music track. I don’t have to know this stuff.”