A-List #10, The: California Dreaming: An A-List Novel (A-List)

by Zoey Dean

  She had never expected to fall for the tall, lanky, smart, sweet basketball star. He was definitely not her type. He read books. He played chess. He did volunteer work. He even liked his parents. Under ordinary circumstances, she would never have given him the time of day.

  But somehow, he had gotten to know her, come to care about her, seen beneath her facade to something hidden underneath. He made her feel vulnerable, like she was walking around without her usual armor of carefully applied makeup and designer clothes. Sometimes Cammie wondered if the girl Adam saw was the girl she might have been if her mom hadn't died when she was much younger. Other times, she thought the whole you-see-the-real-me thing was a clichéd crock of shit. Most of the time, in fact.

  They'd been together for the last part of the school year. Then Adam had left for a camping trip to Michigan--Michigan!--with his parents. It was tolerable for a while. Then annoying for a while longer. Then, when he told her he'd not only decided to extend his stay, he was also thinking of passing up Pomona College, just outside L.A., to actually go to school in Michigan, it had become completely insufferable. Finally, Cammie had given him an ultimatum: Be home by a specific date or be gone.

  He had chosen gone. And then had chosen this night to show up at the club and punch Ben out for kissing her.

  "Adam who?" Cammie said coolly. She nibbled on Ben's earlobe and brushed her lips against his. Slipped just the tip of her tongue daintily into his mouth. If that didn't underscore her answer, words were pointless.

  "Your dad home?" he asked huskily.

  Cammie raised a perfectly plucked eyebrow seductively. "Different wing of the house, remember? I could have the Mormon Tabernacle Choir up to my room for a sing-along and my father wouldn't hear anything."

  He laughed. "I need to lock up. I'll meet you in front."

  She gave him a smoldering look. "Don't take too long."

  She could feel his eyes on her as she sashayed out of the body-shop-themed bar. Cammie and Ben had enlisted the help of students from Cal State's design department to come up with a look for the club's interior, and they'd chosen to incorporate its history as an auto-body repair shop. There were license plates all over the walls, tables made of former car hoods, and even a two-car racing track that circled its interior. The most ambitious part of the concept was that once a week it would be completely revamped in a different decor and style, with only the general floor plan staying the same. The scheme was meant to ensure the club's lasting success, as its patrons got the comfort of a familiar atmosphere with the feeling they were discovering a new place.

  Cammie looked proudly at their handiwork as she made her way toward the exit. She was barely eighteen years old, and she and Ben were the co-owners of the newest and hottest club in L.A. It might not last. But for now, they were the king and queen of Hollywood's nightclub scene, and Cammie was more than ready to claim her throne.

  When she hit the cool night air, she leaned against the club's hard brick exterior to wait for Ben. She bent over to put her shoes back on. They'd of course be coming off again--along with her green party dress--as soon as they made it back to her place, but she knew that the act of removing clothing was half the fun.

  "Cammie."

  She looked up quickly to see a startlingly familiar face. Adam was walking toward her, his hands shoved deep into the pockets of his faded, baggy jeans, still wearing his favorite Ramones T-shirt. Unlike Ben, Adam looked tired--weary, even, like he hadn't slept in days. His lanky frame was slightly hunched, his size-twelve black Converse All-Stars dragging across the asphalt.

  "Have you been out here all this time?" Cammie asked. She set the Cesare Paciotti platform sandal she held in one hand down on the sidewalk, momentarily caught off guard.

  He nodded.

  "The word stalker comes to mind," she said icily, regaining her composure.

  He sighed and crossed his long, basketball-muscled arms over his chest. "What is wrong with you?"

  "With me?" Cammie felt her cheeks redden in anger. "You're the one who showed up here and punched Ben, remember? So what the hell is wrong with you?"

  "Look, I shouldn't have hit Ben." Adam rubbed his face wearily. "That was a stupid asshole thing to do. It's not even my style. I just ... I lost it, seeing him kiss you."

  He had a possessive look in his brown eyes, as if nothing had changed over the past few weeks and he had every right to punch anyone who showed interest in her.

  She opened her Stila-glossed lips to protest but was cut off by her customized Razr's current ring tone: The Who's "Baba O'Riley." Cammie pulled her phone out of her emerald green clutch.

  "Just a sec, Adam."

  "The call can wait," he said impatiently, narrowing his eyes.

  "No. You can wait." She lifted the Razr to her ear. "Yes?"

  "It's me. There's a problem." Cammie was surprised to hear Sam's voice sounding so stressed. "After she left the club tonight, Anna got on a flight to Bali. Don't ask how, it's complicated."

  "So what's the problem with Anna?" Cammie asked, annoyed, leaning against the wall again.

  "What problem with Anna?" Adam interjected quickly. He scratched at the star tattoo under his left ear, a gesture which she knew meant he was nervous.

  Cammie frowned. Adam and Anna had been an item for a few weeks earlier this year, until Anna had lured Ben back into her clutches and promptly dumped Adam. That's how Cammie saw it, at least. Then she and Adam had hooked up. And now it looked like Cammie was with Ben again. It was the Beverly Hills version of six degrees of separation. Laughable in a way. Delicious in another, since she knew Anna cared most for Ben. And now it was Ben-and-Cammie and Anna-and-no-one--just as it should be.

  "Her plane has a mechanical failure." She could hear her friend's voice catch in her throat. "It's coming back to LAX. It's going to crash-land, if it gets that far."

  "What?""What is going on?" Adam demanded.

  Cammie sank a little against the brick wall as adrenaline rushed through her veins at breakneck speed and everything around her flashed into ultrasharp relief. The late-night traffic on Venice Boulevard. The salty aroma of the ocean, as a few wisps of predawn fog rolled in from the Pacific. The brightly lit exterior of the club, which a couple of hours before had been a seething hub of famous partygoers. There were still a few stragglers hanging around, couples who'd had too much to drink. She and Ben had thoughtfully moved some folding chairs to the club exterior for just this eventuality.

  Through her daze, Cammie noticed music that carried through the club's front door. Ben had put on some sort of blues mix for his clean-up-and-close-up work. Eric Clapton's "Key to the Highway" segued into the Climax Blues Band version of "So Many Roads."

  "It's Anna," she turned back to Adam. "She's on a plane that's having some problems."

  "Big problems?"

  "Very."

  "Is there a TV inside?"

  "I think Ben can get reception on one of the video monitors. If you're going in--"

  Adam didn't stick around for the rest of Cammie's sentence. He raced inside to turn on the news. Cammie momentarily wondered if Ben would kick his ass when he saw him. Probably not, once Adam told him what was going on.

  "Cammie, are you still there?" Sam's voice sounded tinny and far away.

  "Yeah. What are you doing now?"

  "On my way to the airport with Eduardo. You want to come? We're just passing Culver City. We could stop and pick you up. The plane's supposed to make an emergency landing in forty-five minutes or so."

  Cammie automatically slipped into her platform sandals, her body naturally springing into action. She was tempted to say yes. But Anna wasn't her friend. Anna had never been her friend. There'd been grudging respect, and there'd been that unwanted and unholy bond through the guys they'd dated, but that was it. It seemed somehow wrong for her to join Sam at the airport, like she'd be pretending to be someone who she wasn't.

  "I'll stay here," Cammie decided. "I'll watch on TV" She kicked a toe idly against the
brick wall of the club. "I'm praying for her," she added. The words were out of her mouth before she could stop herself. Praying? And yet ... she found that she meant it.

  "Okay," Sam said. "I'll call you."

  Sam hung up and Cammie found herself outside alone. The night air felt suddenly chilly and she folded her arms across her chest. Anna Percy was up in the air, on a plane that might not make it safely down. It was ironic in a way, as the only thing Cammie had wanted from Anna since she set foot in Beverly Hills was for Anna to suddenly be gone. But not like this. She never would have wanted anything like this.

  "Cammie?"

  She turned around. Ben was standing in the doorway. He saw her shivering and came over to throw his blazer over her shoulders.

  Cammie felt herself relax at the sudden warmth. For a fraction of a second, she considered not telling him what had happened. They could pick up right where they'd left off, get into his car, and speed the twenty minutes to her house. But now that didn't feel right either. "Sam just called. Anna's on a plane heading back to L.A. that has to make a crash landing."

  "Damn," Ben breathed. He looked like he wanted to say more, but instead clenched his square jaw. She thought she could see a vein pulse at his temple. "Come back in--it must be on the news."

  She hitched a thumb toward the entrance. "Adam's here. He just ran in--did you see him?"

  Ben shook his head.

  "You okay?"

  "Fine, whatever." Ben was already heading back inside, pulling Cammie with him.

  She drew Ben's blazer tight around her tiny size-two waist as they made their way inside. "Let's try to stay positive, all right?"

  Ben merely grunted in response.

  The ten-man crew they'd hired for cleanup at the club had done their work, and the place was spotless again, without a single remnant of the scandalous night that had passed. Adam sat alone at the main bar, his eyes glued to the TV, and he barely looked up as they approached. Cammie felt her breath catch as she saw an illuminated image of the Air East Indonesia jet against the sky. It was being tracked by a couple of Air Force fighters with enormous spotlights, and the announcer was somberly holding forth that this was not an ordinary landing-gear problem. If the plane reached the mainland--and this was still a big if--there would be a dangerous belly landing.

  Cammie and Ben slowly dropped onto the empty bar stools next to Adam, the silence of the club still unbroken. Ben wordlessly poured out three shot glasses full of scotch, and Adam took his gratefully with a tip of the head to Ben.

  On the wide screen that hung above them, a reporter at LAX picked up the story with a live remote. She talked through all the crash-landing preparations, careful to call them "emergency landing" preparations, but everyone knew what she was talking about. Firefighting equipment lined both sides of the runway: the plane had burned off the maximum amount of fuel it could in order to reduce its flammability and weight, and foam had been sprayed at the far end of the landing strip.

  "The pilot will have to exercise extraordinary skill if there is to be no injury or loss of life," the reporter explained. "When we come back after this break, we'll have some statistics for you on this type of forced landing. Historically, it's a sobering record."

  The station cut to a commercial for Coca-Cola, a bunch of smiling teens looking carefree as they sipped from the trademark bottles in the backseat of a red convertible.

  "This is so fucked up," Adam muttered as he extended his empty shot glass to Ben for a refill.

  "Extremely," Cammie agreed as she drained her glass.

  "Ben?" Adam finally looked Ben in the eye.

  "Yeah?" Ben paused midpour.

  "I'm sorry about before, man." He nodded his head at the TV screen, as if to imply that bigger things had put the night into perspective. "I shouldn't have done it."

  "Forget about it." Ben shook his head, his eyes emotionless. He passed the full shot glass over to Adam, and Cammie couldn't help but think that the proffered olive branch took a very different form in L.A. than in Michigan.

  "You know what, guys? I'm outta here." Ben got up slowly from his seat. "I can't watch this shit. You can stay if you want. Cammie, don't forget to set the alarm before you leave. I'll call you in the morning."

  "Where are you going?" Cammie asked, getting up as well. She took off Ben's blazer and extended it toward him.

  "Home." Ben shrugged his broad shoulders, taking the jacket. "This is too depressing." He didn't even look toward the TV as he said it, as if afraid of what images he might see next.

  Cammie nodded her strawberry-blond curls. "I understand."

  She really did understand. You either had to have a sick voyeur gene in your body to watch a friend's plane during its final forty minutes in the air--or you didn't. She knew she had it, and it didn't surprise her that Ben didn't.

  "Thanks," Ben replied dully. "Have a drink or three for me." He kissed her gently, then turned and slowly moved toward the door. She watched him for a moment before turning back to the most horrible reality television she'd ever watched. The most riveting too.

  Sliding into HomeSaturday morning, 4:30 a.m.

  "Approximately one minute prior to landing, our captain will give the command 'Brace!' When he does, you must assume the brace position. Place your feet flat on the floor, put your head on your lap, and clasp your arms under your knees."Yet another of the Airbus flight attendants was giving the instructions into an oversize handheld mic. She was petite, with honey blond hair in a glossy ponytail at the nape of her neck, and a smattering of freckles across her nose. She looked like a high school cheerleader, Anna thought, who should be explaining the way the human pyramid was going to work, not how to save your life in a plane's crash landing.

  Crash. Plane crash.

  Oh God.

  Anna reached for the sleek white Airfone again. Since she couldn't get service on her cell, she'd tried to call her dad twice already on the Airfone, but had gotten a busy signal both times. She'd been able to reach Sam at least. Just hearing her voice had made Anna want to cry. How could this be real? How could it be happening? How could it be happening to her?

  As Anna pressed her father's number into the phone with sweaty hands, she nearly laughed at the absurdity of it: this was what it took for Jane Percy's daughter's palms to perspire. When she heard the dull clanging of the busy signal, she hung up again.

  "I can't get through, either." Logan put his cell back in the pocket of his jeans. The flight attendants had confirmed that it was fine to use them in this emergency, but had said that the Airfones had a better chance of success. For Anna and Logan alike, nothing had worked, except the brief call to Sam.

  Logan's normally tan skin looked pale, and there were a few droplets of perspiration near his blond hairline. He leaned back against the seat, breathing shallowly through his mouth, and Anna turned to face him, concerned. He tried to give her a reassuring smile, but it didn't reach his eyes. Instead he squeezed her hand.

  She turned to gaze across the aisle at an elegant, slender woman with hair pulled back in a tight bun. Sitting impossibly straight in her charcoal Brunello Cucinelli shawl-collar cardigan, she looked like a former ballerina. As Anna watched, the woman extracted a set of ruby-colored rosary beads from a signature brown leather Louis Vuitton clutch. Next to her, a man whose stomach overflowed his seat belt--and his wrinkled lavender Armani shirt--was pounding his third Absolut on the rocks. The flight attendants had told him half-sternly that this one would be his last. His response: "Seriously?"

  Funny. Anna was either going to laugh or cry or scream or--

  "Hey." Logan nudged his shoulder into hers to get her attention. "We'll be fine. The plane lands, we skid like there's no tomorrow, we slide down the emergency chute, and we have a great story to tell at parties."

  "Flashover's gonna get us," the heavy guy mumbled to no one in particular. "Gases get trapped in the cabin and auto-ignite. It's not the crash, it's the fire. We're toast. No way out of this sucker."

&
nbsp; The older, elegant woman next to him closed her eyes and continued with her rosary. Her lips moved but she made no sound.

  "I thought this kind of thing was only supposed to happen in the movies," Logan mumbled.

  Anna searched for a pithy, dry response, but nothing came. All she felt was fear. It was like a pit of acid in her stomach, growing and growing and growing as the plane zoomed closer to Los Angeles. She leaned back in the seat and closed her eyes, trying to rein in her thoughts.

  "I thought ..." she began slowly, her throat suddenly dry. "I thought I had all the time in the world to do whatever I wanted. Go to school and get married and start a family." Anna could feel hot tears fill her eyes, and she blinked them away. She looked down toward her lap, the white of her sundress making the world seem like a snowy blur.

  Logan tightened his grip on her hand. "What seems ridiculous to me is fighting with my dad, my sister. We argued coming back from East Hampton, because she made me wait for her for two hours while she made out with some pretentious asshole from Berkeley who did performance art. I railed at her all the way home. Told her what a jerk he was and made fun of him. Why did I do that?"

  "I'd like to talk to Susan," Anna murmured. "To tell her I love her. And my parents. And Cyn--"

  "Cynthia Baltres." Logan nodded "I remember her. Didn't she bring her mother's fancy bag to first grade?"

  Anna managed a small smile. "She did. And in second grade she didn't wear panties under her skirt and kept mooning all the boys in the cloak room." Anna's smile quavered as she thought about the possibility of never seeing Cyn again. Why hadn't she kept in better touch with her childhood friend? Why hadn't she e-mailed her or texted her or called her every day? She regretted that now. Friends--true friends--were so important. She thought about Sam and gulped hard. Eduardo had sent that portfolio of wedding gown drawings to her. She'd looked beautiful in the sketches, her black-and-white alter ego wearing those gorgeous white flowing dresses. But if Anna didn't make it through this, she'd never get to see her wear one in real life. Instead of being there, watching her friend walk down the aisle with Eduardo someday, everyone would be saying, "Poor Anna."