“So what’s wrong with that?” Dad asks.
“I don’t wanna spend my summer with Judas!” I’m pacing around the room now. “Can’t I just have this for myself? This one summer. I feel like I’ve earned it. Please, Dad.”
“Jerzie. The only thing you’ve earned is the right to not be kidnapped or killed while alone in New York City.” He’s pissed off. Which is somewhat normal for Dad. When it comes to me and Judas, he’s always mad about something. “Judas is coming. And you will deal with it. And if you’re not grateful, pretend to be.” And just like that, he ends the call.
Damn. I hand the phone back to Aunt Karla. She leans forward, her elbows resting on her knees, her braids falling over her shoulders. “Sorry, hon.”
“He’s being unreasonable!”
“Don’t hate me, but I think he has a good point.”
“Are you serious?”
“Kinda. Yeah.” She stands. “I can’t take you to Times Square and pick you up every day. It’s too much. Take now, for example. I have to go back in to work for an emergency meeting, and I don’t like the idea of you being here by yourself.”
“You’re leaving? Now?”
“Take-out menus are in the top drawer in the kitchen. Money, too.” She crosses to the closet and yanks out a pile of fresh bedding. “You gonna be okay for a few hours?”
“Yeah. I’ll be cool,” I reply. “I guess.”
She hands me the pile of neatly folded sheets and blankets, squeezes my shoulder, and exits the room.
I take my time making the bed. Pulling the fitted sheet so it’s smooth. Making sure the flat sheet is even on both sides. Fluffing the pillows. When I’m satisfied, I grab my bag off the floor and type in the code on the keypad mounted beside the window. A second later, a soft beep lets me know I’ve successfully deactivated the alarm system. I slide open the window in Aunt Karla’s master suite, climb through, and step onto the balcony.
It’s not officially summer, but New York did not get that memo. It’s evening, so the temperature has dropped a few degrees, but the air still feels thick, like you could slice your way through it, and my T-shirt is sticking to my skin. I peel the fabric away and fan the shirt in an attempt to cool down. I’m mostly just blowing around hot air. I set my bag at my feet, remove my tablet, and get snuggled on one of the patio chairs. There’s a string of lights wrapped around the wrought iron railing, casting a glow across the balcony. I stare up at the evening sky, tinted pink from the setting sun.
“Alexa.” The light around the speaker beside my chair flashes blue. “Play Phantom of the Opera.”
“The Phantom of the Opera, original London cast and Andrew Lloyd Webber on Amazon Music,” Alexa says in her robotic tone.
The music begins, and I get settled into relaxation mode. I know Robbie and Alan said Zeppelin wasn’t on social media. But maybe things have changed now. I Google Zeppelin Reid on my tablet. The only thing that comes up is the playbill announcement about him joining the cast of Roman and Jewel. His headshot is the only picture I can find online. I add Zeppelin Reid Facebook. Nothing. Zeppelin Reid Twitter. Nope. No Twitter account. He really has managed to stay off social media. Fascinating.
Next, I Google Cinny, boyfriend. I see she’s rumored to be dating Shivers. He has a song called “Shiver Me Timbers,” and in the video, this dude literally walks around with a peg leg.
“Alexa?”
The music pauses and the speaker turns blue.
“Um, play Shivers?”
“Shuffling music by Shivers from Amazon Music,” Alexa replies.
Rap blares through the speakers.
“Cuz I’m gangsta. Not cho momma’s wanksta. You mutha fuckin’ pranksta!”
“Alexa!” I literally scream. The music pauses again. “Turn it off. I can’t. Shivers sucks.”
The speaker powers down and Shivers fades into the evening.
“Alexa. Play Hamilton.”
“Playing Hamilton, original Broadway recording by various artists,” Alexa replies.
Sensible music booms through the speakers. More than sensible. This music fuels me.
I should log on to Instagram. Do another live feed. My 114 followers await. We can finish our “what’s in a name” conversation that got cut short this morning. I slide my phone out of my back pocket, open Instagram and study the screen.
Eight hundred notifications? That’s like, impossible. What the hell is wrong with my account? I ignore the red icon with the hundreds of notifications. I’m sure it’s some sort of glitch. I open the camera, fluff out the ponytail on top of my head, and press the button to go live.
I wait a moment for someone to start watching. Riley_Roo is the first to join the room. I grin. Riley_Roo, aka Riley Powell, aka my best friend. We used to go to the same school, but Riley left for a public school with a better softball team. Unfortunately the school they settled on just so happens to be Newark, a forty-minute train ride away, so I pretty much never see her anymore.
“Hey, Riley!” I blow a kiss to the camera.
Riley_Roo: I’ve called you twice! Tell me about the show damnit!
I lean back in my chair, holding up the phone so my face is in full view and the balcony lights make my skin all glowy. I smile. “Whatcha wanna know?”
Riley_Roo: Do all the boys on Broadway look like yours? Cuz daaaamn. I should give up sports and learn how to sing.
What is she talking about? What boy?
Only before I can comment, the room fills up. Fast. I go from one person watching to five hundred. In a matter of seconds? I’ve never had more than a few people watch my live feeds. I study the messages as they pop up on the screen:
Phamtasiaz: Omigosh it’s Jewel! I love your voice. You’re amazing!
BillyIsMyElliot112: You make me wanna be in love.
American_Idolz777: Are you guys actually dating in real life?
BreeBrums: Can’t wait to see the show!
My brow furrows. There’s more. The messages are scrolling so fast.
Hot_sauceLover: Sing for us right now. Sing!!
KikisBaba: I never heard of you before? Where you been?
Monkeys_Mischief: I love you Jerzie Jhames!
Ram_Butt_Booty16: You foul! Cheating on me?! I been so loyal!
The messages are scrolling so fast I can’t read anymore. And suddenly the room has one thousand people in it. What the holy hell is happening? I press the button to end the feed.
A call is coming through from Judas. With shaking hands I click the button to accept it. My brother’s voice blares through my speakers.
“Hey yo. Sup, sis?”
“Judas.” I sit up, my heart still racing from the eerie live feed. “Everything okay?”
“Yeah, man. I saw your video.”
“What video?”
“The one on YouTube. With the boy. Get it, sis!” He laughs.
I sit up and uncross my legs. My bare feet settle onto the warm concrete of the balcony. “I don’t have a video on YouTube with a boy.”
“Man, whatever. I watched it like three times. I stop it before the end though. Too gross.”
“Judas? I swear I dunno what you’re talking about.”
“The video of you and the white dude. Where y’all kiss at the end.”
I snatch my tablet off the chair. “What’s the title?”
“Roman and Jewel.”
As I type it in into the YouTube app, a crushing sensation settles in.
“Hiro told me about it when we were playing Financial Football online,” Judas explains. “I thought he was joking and didn’t think nothin’ of it. But then Brian texted me and DeMario and Jesse and like fifteen other people from school. I guess they all saw it on Instagram.”
“Instagram?” I click the link so that the video begins to play. Crushing sensation shifts int
o overdrive. Judas is not lying. There is a video of Zeppelin and me on YouTube. We’re singing “I Think I Remember You.” Our entire performance is now playing right before my eyes.
“You still there?” Judas asks.
“Judas, who could’ve uploaded this? This was a private thing we did earlier today. I was helping Cinny. This shouldn’t be online.”
I check the video’s time stamp. It was uploaded exactly two hours ago. Did Robbie do this? Rehearsal ended early for everyone except Cinny and, well...me. Robbie (or anyone else for that matter) would have had the time to get home and get it online. But why would he do such a thing? Why would anyone do such a thing?
“It’s on Twitter, too,” Judas continues. “And yo, the hashtag Roman and Jewel is trending. Jerz, it’s on all the social media networks. You’re viral.”
I double-check the number below the video, the one that tracks the amount of views. Two point five million?
I’m pacing now. Back and forth on the balcony. Me? Viral? A small smile creeps onto my face right at the moment a terrifying thought occurs. What if Cinny has seen this? This is worse than Black Panther being watched by second Black Panther. This is Black Panther being challenged on Challenge Day and thrown over the side of a cliff! How has this happened? Who’s responsible?!
“Judas, I’ll call you back.”
As I hang up and step back in through the window, my phone is ringing again. It’s Riley. I accept the call and hold up the phone. Riley’s sitting in a dugout, face covered in smears of dirt, blond hair pulled back into a messy ponytail.
“Riley? Are you at practice?”
“Nope.” She blows a bubble, and it fills up the screen before she sucks it back into her mouth. The sound of a large crowd cheering blares through my phone speakers.
“You’re at a game?!”
“Eh. Something like that.” She blows another bubble.
“Get off the fucking phone!” a male voice cries out.
“One sec, Coach!” She leans forward and whispers, “I should probably go. But, dude! How are you viral? My best friend is viral?” More cheers. Riley stands, staring out over the phone. “Nice hit, Kaitlyn!” She looks back at me. “Not that you’re any competition for Cinny’s video, but I mean, yours still has millions of views.”
“Cinny’s video?” I stop pacing and stare at the screen.
“Yeah. It’s obviously a publicity stunt.” She snorts. “Cuz she’s all over the place in her version. But it was funny. Made me laugh. Still like your version better.”
“Riley Powell!” the male voice screams over the roar of the crowd. “End that FaceTime call in one second or you die.”
“Coach is threatening my life. Gotta run. I’ll call you later!”
She ends the call. I sit slowly on the edge of the bed. Now I type in Roman and Jewel/Cinny into the YouTube search engine. The top video to pop up has seventy million views so far, and it was uploaded two hours ago, too. I click it...and cover my mouth with my shaking hand as I watch Cinny and Zeppelin performing “I Think I Remember You.”
It’s actually a montage of many of their rehearsals. Cinny falling on her ass. Cinny messing up. Cinny missing cues. Cinny singing the wrong note. It ends with today’s performance, where she trips over her own two feet and she and Zeppelin clunk heads.
Roman and Jewel Coming Soon scrolls across the screen.
“I Thought All for the Best”
After fifteen texts and twenty-something phone calls, Aunt Karla made her ride-share driver do a U-turn to bring her back home. She’s currently sitting on the couch, staring at her own phone, watching the viral video. When it finishes with the kiss, she looks up and grins.
“You didn’t tell me about the kiss, you little sneak.” She laughs.
My video was up to 3.5 million and Cinny’s was holding steady at ninety million before they were both removed from YouTube. But the videos were downloaded and reuploaded by other users, so they’re still everywhere. Vlogger videos have them embedded in their online dialogue. News outlets are playing the footage and discussing it. Cinny is trending on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, too.
The comments are brutal. It’s an online Cinny assassination. I’m scrolling through Twitter as I pace in front of Aunt Karla:
YogiLover: Cinny is Broadway gone K-mart #RomanAndJustStopSinging
Geranimo777: Dictionary definition of Cinny: WORST. #Ugh #GirlBYE
TaylorsSuperSwift: Listening to Cinny butcher Robert Christian Ruiz’s music is like eating vomit stew. Then throwing it up. #VomitSquared #MuteCinny
JohnnyBeGooder: What do you expect? With a dumb name like Cinny. Did anybody think she could actually sing?
Brett_GameofThongs: NYC officials are on high alert. Cinny is banned from even walking down Broadway. Let alone being on one of their stages. If you see her. TELL somebody!!!
“You need to stop reading that stuff.” Aunt Karla leans her head back on the couch. “It’s gonna give you a panic attack.”
She’s right. It is making me anxious. Especially because interspersed between the online Cinny dragging is praise and adulation for...well...me. It seems the internet knows how to research, because somewhere, somehow, the trolls have discovered that I, Jerzie Jhames, am cast as Cinny’s understudy:
GoGoGo_Joseph: If Cinny’s falling in a forest and nobody is around. Can we leave her there so Jerzie Jhames can take her job?
PickledBeets: Joke of the day: What did the understudy say to Cinny? You STINK. #Unemployment #MuteCinny #Jerzie-Jhames4EVA
WherezCarmenSandiego: Jerzie Jhames as the understudy for Cinny would be like Beyonce being the understudy for DocMcStuffins. #BroadwayFailway
MaryJanesHurtMyFeet: Poor Jerzie Jhames. Stuck in a Broadway nightmare. #WakeUpJerzieJhames
There’s more. Hundreds. Thousands of tweets. I toss my phone onto the couch so that it’s out of reach. “It’s today’s news. The internet’s gonna move on.” I look at Aunt Karla. “Right?”
“Do you want it to?” She grabs my phone and fiddles with it. “Yesterday you were holding steady at 114 followers on Instagram. Would you like to guess how many you have now?”
“I dunno. A thousand?”
“Girl, bye. Almost one hundred thousand.”
“Holy shit!” I cover my mouth with both hands.
Aunt Karla only laughs. I’d laugh with her, but all I can think about is Cinny. It shouldn’t be #WakeUpJerzieJhames trending, it should be #WakeUpCinny. If this is my dream come true, it’s her real-life nightmare.
“What’s gonna happen at work tomorrow? What if Cinny makes them fire me or something?”
“Fire you?” Aunt Karla repeats. “Why? It’s not your fault she’s getting dragged.”
The screen on my phone is lit up now. A call is coming through. I don’t recognize the number, but something says to answer it. I move to the couch, grab it off the cushion, and press the button to accept the call.
“Hello?”
“Jerzie? It’s Alan Kaplan. I got permission to call you from your mom.”
Oh, God, no! I look at Aunt Karla with panic eyes. Worse than panic. Desperate, I’m-about-to-get-fired eyes. “It’s the director,” I whisper.
Aunt Karla grimaces.
“Any chance you and your guardian can meet me at my office this evening? I know it’s short notice, but I’m close to Forty-Second Street Studios. Corner building. Eighteenth floor, suite 1806.”
“One second. Let me see.” I press the mute button and stare at Aunt Karla. “He wants to know if we can come to his office. Like, right now.”
She frowns. “It can’t wait until tomorrow?”
I unmute the call. “Alan? My aunt says she can bring me.”
“Perfect. I’ll have your names added to the list at Security.”
“Is this about the videos? Am I in trouble?”
“This is about the videos.” He sighs. “But you’re not in trouble. We’ll discuss when you get here. See you soon.”
* * *
The train ride to Times Square is a somber one. At least, for me. Aunt Karla’s even stopped trying to cheer me up. She does wrap an arm around my waist and lay her head on top of mine. I contemplate turning my phone off in hopes of calming the anxiety and also stopping the stream of texts coming in. When Mom messaged me and said, Wow, Jerzie was that your first kiss?! What a dreamy guy. Go daughter! I think I died a little. My entire family is watching me being kissed for the first time. On repeat.
To add to everybody and my mom texting me weird congratulations, strangers are staring at me. I kid you not. Okay, fine. One person on the subway is staring at me. Maybe it’s because I’m wearing one of Aunt Karla’s nice dresses. An orange, flowy Rebecca Taylor dress that ties in the front, with knee-high strappy sandals. I figured whatever sort of bad news I’m about to get from Alan would be better received dressed in something classy and respectable.
“That girl might be recognizing you,” Aunt Karla whispers.
I slump down onto the cold plastic seat, tightly gripping the metal handrail beside me, focusing my full attention on the dirty floor of the subway car. When we make it to the Forty-Second Street stop and Aunt Karla and I stand to exit, both moving swiftly with the crowd onto the platform, I feel someone tap my shoulder. I spin around. It’s the girl who was staring at me. She’s holding another girl’s hand, and they’re both grinning at me like fools.
“Yeah?” A part of me wonders if maybe I know them from home or something. Maybe we used to go to school together. But that part of me gets proven real wrong when one of them asks, “Are you from the Romeo and Juliet video?”
I know my mouth should be moving in some semblance of a response. I blink instead.
“It is her,” the other girl declares. “See. I told you.”
“Is that your real boyfriend?” the first girl inquires. “You can tell he really loves you. You love him, too, huh?”
I blink again.
“For love!” the first girl exclaims, holding up her girlfriend’s hand. They kiss on the lips, giggle, and rush off up the stairs.
Roman and Jewel Page 7