Duchess

by Nikki Wilson

  He hadn't meant to say any of that, but it was too late to take it back now.

  Katie opened and closed her mouth a couple of times before she finally spoke.

  "Well, right now seventeen thousand people are chanting the name of my 'mask,' and I will not disappoint them. But it seems I will disappoint you ... again. I'm sorry I can't live up to your high standards."

  She pulled her arm out of his grip and walked away.

  Chase stared after her and wondered what had gone wrong. He never knew the right thing to say to her.

  "What was that about?" Amber was now standing next to him.

  He shook his head. "Nothing. I guess she changed her mind." He walked away. It was almost time for the show to start, and he needed to find something to do to take his mind off Katie. How he was going to do that when she took center stage, he wasn't sure.

  ***

  Katie waited on stage for the curtain to lift. The normal pre-show jitters didn't come. She was in an emotion-free bubble. She'd experienced so many feelings over the course of the past week, she didn't know if she had any left. Still, she hoped for the adrenaline rush that normally came when everyone cheered for her. She needed to know that her years as Duchess weren't in vain, that some people had connected with her.

  She could hear the chanting of the crowd as the curtain lifted, and a small current of excitement went through her. This was what she needed. She needed to get back on stage and do what she loved, making people happy.

  As the music started, she lost herself in the performance. She didn't have to be Katie anymore. She could be Duchess, the pop diva everyone adored. Why would she want to be Katie when she could be Duchess? The music took her on a ride. She could dance and sing and forget all her worries and cares. At least, that’s what she’d hoped.

  The next song started, and Katie looked at the audience. They were enjoying themselves. They were having fun. They loved Duchess. Suddenly, that thought made her sad. She could hear Chase's voice saying Duchess was her mask because she didn't think people would like her for her. The truthfulness of that statement hit her in the gut. She didn't think people would like the music she wrote. None of the record labels liked it—they said she wasn't edgy enough. Could she have made it eventually, singing her songs? What would her mom want her to do?

  She stopped in the middle of her dance step and quit singing. The music went on without her for a moment before stopping. Silence descended, and she realized she should say something. What was she doing? She suddenly knew what she wanted to do. She was ready to take off her mask. It was time to see if Duchess’s adoring fans could love her too. With a quick look upward, she blew a kiss up to heaven for her mother. She would do this for her.

  "Hello, everyone. Thanks for coming tonight. This is a very special cause you are all supporting. You see, about twelve years ago, my brother was a soldier in Iraq. Unlike the soldiers who will be helped by this concert tonight, he never came home."

  People in the audience started whispering, and she knew she couldn't stop now.

  "I've been secretive about who I am because I thought you wouldn't like me if you knew the truth. I mean, there's not much exciting about plain old Katie." She pulled off the platinum wig and the big sunglasses hiding her bloodshot eyes that couldn't handle contacts that night. Next, she pulled off the fake nose, pain causing her eyes to water. But she didn't care. It was time to reveal herself.

  "Can I get a regular microphone?" She looked to the wings of the stage. Soon, someone brought one out, and she threw off the head mic that made her voice sound robotic. It was time to let everyone hear her real voice.

  "You see, I tried to make it in the music industry as myself, but kept getting told I wasn't edgy enough, or that I was too trained. When my mother was diagnosed with cancer, I suddenly needed to make people love me, so I became what I thought they wanted. And that's how Duchess was born."

  Everyone held their cell phones in the air, and she knew they were recording.

  “So, anyway. This is me. I’m Katie. You may know me as Duchess’s manager. This week, my wonderful mother died of cancer, and she helped me realize that this life is too short to spend it hiding behind masks. So I’ll sing you a song that I wrote for her.”

  Quickly, a guitar and mic stand were found backstage, and she hoped she wouldn’t chicken out. But as she began strumming the guitar, she pictured her mother’s face when she’d sung to her right before she died. She sang to her mother again with all the love she had in her.

  The song ended, and silence reigned. She had proof that no one wanted plain old Katie. She turned to leave, but just then, the bowl erupted in applause. Spinning back around, she watched as people rubbed tears out of their eyes and tried to clap at the same time. Everyone stood, and Katie’s eyes widened as she brought her hand up to cover her mouth. The audience hadn’t shunned her—they embraced her. Her mother had been right.

  ***

  Chase watched from the wings as Katie finished her song and silence enveloped the stadium. Tears streaked down his cheeks, and he couldn’t take his eyes off her. When the audience erupted in applause, he couldn’t help but join in. As Katie left the stage, Chase stood in front of her, blocking her path. She stopped before him and looked up. They stared awkwardly at each other for a moment before he spoke.

  “Katie, that was beautiful.”

  “Oh, um, thanks.” She brushed away a tendril of hair that had fallen into her face.

  He wanted to add that she was beautiful too, but before he could speak again, they were interrupted.

  “Oh, Kate! You were magnificent!” Amber pushed past Chase and flung her arms around Katie.

  They hugged for moment, then Katie stepped back.

  “You’re not mad at me?”

  “Whatever for?” Amber looked genuinely confused.

  “Because I’m Duchess, and I didn’t tell you my secret.”

  Amber snorted. “Why would I be angry about that? It’s Hollywood. Everyone wears a mask, but not everyone can use that mask to help others like you did tonight.”

  Chase just stared at Amber, unable to process her words. She didn’t feel betrayed by Katie’s deception? Why did he?

  Before he could answer that question, Amber threw one arm around his waist and her other arm around Katie. “This concert was a wild success. Katie, your mother was a genius, and if I could, I would kiss her right now.”

  “My mother?” Katie asked, cocking her head to the side.

  “Of course. This whole benefit concert was her idea. I didn’t think it would ever work—especially when she was adamant that Chase had to be the one to help you put it on. I never thought he would agree.” She turned to look at Chase. “You almost didn’t, huh, Chase? But in the end, Shirley was right. It was amazing! I can’t even begin to thank you both for all you did.”

  She pulled them close into a group hug.

  Chase tried to process what Amber had just said. Would Shirley really have orchestrated this whole concert to get Chase and Katie together? The answer popped into his mind right away. Yes, she would.

  He thought about how innocent Shirley had acted, pretending she didn’t know about the benefit concert and why Chase had come over to ask Katie for help. But it had been her plan the whole time!

  He looked up and caught Katie staring back at him. A slight smile tugged at the corner of her mouth. Chase couldn't hold back his laughter anymore as he thought of Shirley’s little deception. Soon, Katie joined him. Finally, Chase and Katie got their laughter under control just to be interrupted by Katie's assistant holding out a cell phone.

  "Excuse me, Duchess. I mean, Katie. I mean..." The poor girl looked absolutely frazzled.

  "It's okay, Penny. What's wrong?"

  "It's Kyle. He said he needs to speak to you right now." She shook the phone for emphasis.

  ***

  Katie still smiled. She had to laugh at her mother's matchmaking attempt—she only wished it had all worked out. With a sigh, she t
ook the phone from Penny.

  "Hello?"

  "Katie? What did you do?"

  Suddenly, all the humor drained away as she realized the ramifications of her actions.

  "Oh, hi, Kyle." She wasn't sure what else to say.

  "'Oh, hi'? Is that all you have to say for yourself? You decide to tell the world all about Duchess without so much as a warning? I thought we were friends, but now the record label is going to have to sue you for breach of contract. You know it says you aren’t allowed to disclose the true identity of Duchess."

  Katie knew she should feel dread and regret at the thought of an impending lawsuit, but instead she felt ... free.

  "I'm sorry, Kyle. I really am. I’ll get you the name of my attorney. The label can send the paperwork right over."

  She hung up the phone without saying good-bye. A heavy weight lifted off her chest, and for the first time in two years, she wasn’t shackled to the secret of Duchess.

  “Are you all right?” Chase asked, worry etched on his face.

  As she took a deep breath, Katie smiled.

  “You know what? I think I will be.” She leaned over, kissing his cheek. “Thank you for everything,” she whispered before walking away with her head held high.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Waking up, Katie found herself folded in the chair next to her mother’s empty bed. Stretching out her stiff muscles, she looked at the mess around her. Half-eaten pizza sat in a box on the floor next to her guitar, and papers scribbled with words and music notes dotted the carpet. Since the concert three days before, she hadn’t been outside the room. She’d been holed up with her guitar and the music in her head demanding to be written.

  The knock on the door startled her, causing her to drop some of the papers she’d just picked up.

  “Maria, I told you to go home,” she shouted as she bent down to pick up the music sheets again. She heard the door open and she turned to tell Maria to go away, but stopped as Chase walked in.

  “I’m pretty sure she didn’t listen to you, since she just let me in and gave me the key to this room.” He had a crooked smile on his face, and she couldn’t help but notice his crisp, clean jeans that were tight in all the right places. His shirt looked ironed, and his hair was combed back.

  She looked down at her own sweats and T-shirt. She knew her hair was sticking out all over the place, and she wasn’t sure if she ever really washed off the Duchess makeup from the concert. She suddenly wished she’d never given Maria that key.

  “Remind me to fire her when I get the chance.” She tried to straighten her hair, but instead, her fingers got stuck in the tangles. Sighing, she gave up and busied herself putting her music sheets onto the chair and picking up her guitar off the floor.

  “Fire her? The woman deserves a raise for keeping you alive for the past three days. I have a feeling you wouldn’t have had anything to eat or drink if it wasn’t for her. As for keeping the press away so you could play hermit, she should get a medal for that feat.” Chase walked closer, and she held her guitar in front of her like it would protect her heart from his piercing eyes.

  “Okay, so maybe I won’t fire her today.” She paused for a moment before asking, “What are you doing here, Chase?”

  “I’ve come to take you away from all this.” He gestured around the dark room littered with takeout cartons and music sheets.

  “Take me where?” She tilted her head and crossed her arms over her chest.

  “It’s a surprise.” His vague reply sent warning bells off in her mind.

  “I’m not going anywhere.” She leveled a serious look in his direction.

  “I thought you would say that.” He turned back the way he came and opened the bedroom door. “So I brought reinforcements.”

  Amber strode into the room and stopped in her tracks as she looked around at the disaster around them.

  “Good gravy, girl! What happened in here?” Amber looked at Katie, and her eyes widened. “And don’t even get me started on how you look right now.”

  It was enough to give a girl a complex, but she couldn’t help but smile at Amber’s exuberance.

  “It’s not that bad,” Katie protested half-heartedly.

  “She’s already at the delusional stage,” Amber said to Chase, who was chuckling to himself. “What would David say if he saw you like this?”

  “Take a nap?” Katie answered hopefully.

  “He would say to quit wallowing and get to work.”

  Katie could suddenly see why Amber was so good with the veterans she helped. She sounded like a drill sergeant.

  Amber grabbed Katie’s hand and began to pull her out of the room. “Come with me. We’re going to clean you up.”

  Katie shot a glare at Chase as she reluctantly left the room. Before she could protest, Amber took her to the bathroom and shoved her toward the shower.

  “I’ll find you some clothes while you wash off the stink of day-old pizza.”

  She obeyed, and before she knew it, Amber had her looking like a model. How the woman pulled off that miracle, Katie didn’t know.

  Trudging down the stairs, she followed Amber to the waiting car in the drive. Chase was already in the passenger seat, and Amber headed to the driver’s side. Curious about the plans of her devious companions, Katie opened the back door and climbed in.

  “Where are we going?” she asked.

  “Do you even know what’s been going on since the de-masking of Duchess?”

  “Oh, I’m pretty sure I can imagine. Right now, the media is probably having a field day, laughing at the would-be singer/songwriter girl who didn’t have enough talent to make it with her own voice, so she had to dress up and use synthesizers. I’m sure there are pictures from my high school yearbook scrounged up by some overenthusiastic journalist intern. Oh, and let’s not forget the entertainment journalists who are claiming they knew all along that Duchess was a fraud. Gee, I can’t imagine why I would want to lock myself away from all of that.”

  She waited for Chase to respond, but he turned back to looking out the windshield with a smirk, not saying a thing.

  The thick silence made her uneasy. “What’s going on? What did I miss?” She looked to each of them for an answer, but neither one said a thing until Amber stopped the car in the parking lot of the Hollywood Bowl.

  Chase twisted in his seat to face Katie. “You got part of it right.”

  She sighed. “How’s that?”

  “The media is having a field day, but not for the reasons you think. Videos of you singing that song for your mom have gone viral, and everyone’s wondering why you were hiding behind a synthesizer in the first place.”

  Katie stared at him with her mouth open.

  “You must be mistaken.”

  “I’m not, and we’re here so I can prove it to you.”

  Looking around, she noticed the parking lot was fuller than normal on a weekday afternoon. She shifted her gaze toward the stadium and saw a giant sign that said, “We love Katie!”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “What don’t you understand? People recognize true talent when they hear it. They love you, Katie. They love your song—they love your voice. If you would come out of hiding, they would love everything else about you too.”

  “Is that what this is about? Am I coming out of hiding right now?” Her pulse sped up, and her eyes widened.

  “Not exactly. In fact, you’ll need to be in hiding a little longer. Amber?”

  Amber got out, opened the backdoor, and produced a bag from the floor of the backseat. “These items should help you stay incognito.”

  Opening the bag, Katie found large sunglasses and a big floppy hat. Her eyebrows scrunched together as she looked up.

  “Just put them on and trust me,” Chase said as he held her gaze.

  Heat flooded through her, and she realized she did trust him. Even if he had broken her heart.

  Obeying his request, she placed the hat on her head and slid the sungl
asses over her eyes. “Now what?” she asked.

  “Now we hike.” Chase got out of the car and walked around to open her door.

  As they walked toward the stairs, Katie looked back at the car and noticed that Amber wasn’t coming with them. The idea of being alone with Chase thrilled and terrified her at the same time. Climbing the steps, she followed him to the same spot where they had eaten their picnic lunch the first time she’d brought him there.

  She sat down and looked toward the stage, noticing a gathering of people with cameras and microphones. Sitting in the lower level seats was a small crowd of people chanting something she couldn’t hear and holding signs she couldn’t read.

  “What’s going on?”

  “You’ll see.” The half-smile on his face caused a fluttering feeling in her gut. She studied him as he turned back to watch the stage. The anger she’d seen since he found out about Duchess was gone. She hoped he could forgive her. He might not ever feel for her what she felt for him, but the thought of not having him in her life caused a shiver to go down her spine.

  “Can I have your attention, please?” The voice that came over the speakers had Katie whipping her gaze to the stage. Her jaw dropped open as she saw her father addressing the audience. “I know you all have lots of questions and would love nothing more than to see Katie for yourselves, but I would like to remind you that her mother passed away less than a week ago, and she would like some space to grieve.”

  That statement produced a flurry of activity among the media. Questions were fired at the stage, and she watched in awe as her father answered them all with ambiguous statements. One question caught Katie’s attention.

  “Are the rumors that Duchess’s record label is going to sue Katie true?”

  She groaned as she remembered her last phone conversation with Kyle.

  “Actually, the record label and Katie’s attorney have come to an understanding that won’t make a lawsuit necessary.” Her father’s confident answer pulled a gasp from Katie.