“Mom?” I frown, then take the deepest breath I’ve taken all day. “Well, she thinks I should be in Brazil for a while. Hang out with my family, stay away from LA and the cameras. Until it all blows over.”
Brenda groans. “Can you take me with you? Mom wants me to think about colleges and, um, no thanks! I don’t even know where I can get in with my meh GPA.”
“You two are in serious need of pep talks, gotta say.” Padma shakes her head. “Why aren’t you already there? You know we’re both here for you, but if you can stay with your grandparents and a bunch of cousins, isn’t that even better?”
I sink in the bed and bring my comforter up to my chin.
Not really, I think to myself. I’m not that confident in my Portuguese. So I can’t communicate with my grandparents, because they don’t speak good English, and while some of my cousins do, they all just…they just give me these judgmental looks. So I’m not going back unless someone shoves me into an airplane.
But instead I say, “Aaaaaanyway.”
Padma urges Brenda to give her my phone. She also knows the password. “What’s the name of that soap opera? The one with the feminist lawyer who wants to start a revolution and falls in love with a prince?”
Cordel Encantado is a good show.
Brenda gets on her knees and says, “Ooh, what if we watched Girl, Interrupted? Angelina Jolie is my dream in that movie.”
“Don’t.” Padma raises a finger. “She’s old enough to be your mother. Please.”
“You’re just jealous,” Brenda teases, cocking an eyebrow.
And then she bridges the distance, literally stepping on me to get to Padma and give her girlfriend a peck. I roll my eyes, but I’m used to third-wheeling.
Brenda snuggles in between us, grabs another doughnut, then surveys me with a smirk. “What about Girl, Memefied?”
I let out an inhuman noise of annoyance, but we all laugh at that.
* * *
I jolt awake from a nightmare in which I’m dancing around in Carmen Miranda’s clothing at a big awards show and everyone tells me to go back to Brazil. I wake up feeling sweaty and nauseous, with Brenda’s legs thrown over me and Padma’s face buried in my neck. I not-so-gently push them aside, take my phone, and go to my en suite bathroom.
The cold water on my face clears away the weird nightmare feeling, but I’m still more asleep than awake when I sit to pee. As per usual, I grab my phone to scroll through social media, but my apps are all gone.
Stubbornly, I access Twitter from the phone browser.
It’s supposed to be a quick thing. Just check what everyone’s up to—what I’ve been missing this week.
It’s not a quick thing.
The first thing I see upon logging in? A fan account posting a picture of Trent and Reese. They’re holding hands and looking passionately into each other’s eyes. The caption is only a bunch of heart-eyes emojis.
I feel like I’m going to be sick.
I can’t believe they’re already dating. Posing together like some kind of power couple. I mean, it’s only been a week since he dumped me!
I go to Trent’s Twitter account to see what he’s been tweeting and release a breath of relief. He’s posted pictures of himself, broody and handsome in Hugo Boss this week, and—is that my favorite Thai restaurant? Possibly. I can’t tell. But at least he’s not posting pictures with her…yet.
I grit my teeth and flush. With my pants still down and my eyes still glued to the phone screen, I click his likes.
The first one is of me.
Or, well, a version of me.
In the tweet I’ve got my index finger pressed to his chest. The caption is you promised you’d make me queen. There are thousands of likes and retweets.
And Trent Nicholson, the boy I dated for the past eight months, liked it.
“Escroto,” I curse, but I sort of want to cry, too.
With a lot more strength than necessary, I poke my phone to close the app. The phone goes flying out of my hand…
…and splashes into the toilet. I yelp, take a step back, and nearly trip on the pool of my pants around my ankles.
For a moment, I just stand there, dazed. This is about as far away from being a queen as I could get.
Then I pull up my pants and sigh. Someone has to fish that phone out of the toilet.
And someone’s got to do something about the pathetic mess I’ve become.
Neither Padma nor Brenda appreciates it when I pull my bedroom curtains open, letting an aggressive amount of sunlight into the once-dark room. Both of them groan, and Padma screams that she hates me, but I don’t really mind. After this morning’s unexpected ritual of washing my hands a thousand times, I’m on a mission.
I jump on the end of the bed, and yank the blanket away from Brenda when she tries to cover her head with it.
“Focus, girls! I need you alert.”
Padma starts talking in Sindhi, and I can’t tell if she’s cursing at me or just cursing me. Brenda eventually sits up, half zombie, half gas-station doll forgotten by time.
“I don’t want to be awake right now. I don’t want to—can I not be awake right now?”
“No, Brenda, you have to be awake. I need to talk to you.” I play-slap her arm.
“Ouch! I’m awake! I’m awake!”
“Good. You have Bobbi’s phone number, right? Where’s your phone? I need to call her.”
“I can’t believe you woke us up for this. What time—?” Padma grabs her own phone from under the pillow. “It’s eight in the morning! I’m a DJ, I’m like a bat! I thrive in darkness!” Unceremoniously, she flops back on the bed and covers her head with the blanket.
“Just—” Brenda gestures dismissively and yawns. “Just call her using your phone, Jesus.”
“I…There was an incident with my phone.” I press my lips together in a thin line.
Brenda’s too sleepy to catch my distress.
“Brenda!” I yell. Padma tries to kick me from under the blanket, but I’m much too skillful to be hit by a sleeping zombie. “Where’s your phone?”
She rolls her eyes and points at the bag she dropped by the door last night when she arrived.
Perfect.
I jump out of the bed, and the second I leave, Brenda crawls back under the blanket to snuggle up to her girlfriend. I’m betting in a half second she’ll be back asleep.
I rifle through Brenda’s curiously numerous hoodies until I find her phone. I’m a little breathless when I finally find Bobbi’s contact—listed under “Natalie’s Agent-Mom.”
Bobbi answers on the second ring.
“Hello, Brenda?”
“It’s me, Bobbi. Natalie,” I tell her. “Gather the team. We need to do something about this shit.”
Bobbi lets out a joyful whoop, and then says, “Don’t you swear, Natalie. Language. But yes. Meet me at my office in an hour.”
* * *
The large office feels almost like a second home to me. It gives me a sense of comfort as I walk in, even though I’m being ushered into a meeting room where Ashley is sitting cross-legged on the couch opposite Bobbi. The director of the PR and marketing team is a woman in her forties with a sleek bob and red lipstick, which is always absolutely impeccable. She’s a lot more serious than any other adult I work with, and I find her intimidating, but Ashley has warranted my trust and eternal gratitude for introducing me to Padma.
“Hi, so good to see you, Ashley!” I offer her my hand. “Sorry this is such short notice.”
Bobbi appears behind me a second later. “It’s true. Thank you for coming so quickly, Ashley.” She puts a hand on my shoulder with a motherly smile.
“Of course.” Ashley stands to shake my hand and then sits down again. She has her assistant with her, a man in his twenties who is so cute that I’
m suddenly ashamed of my only-slightly-better-than-pajamas yoga pants and oversize hoodie.
I pretend I’m scratching my nose with my shoulder to try and catch a whiff of the smell. Not great.
“Merda,” I curse.
Ashley glances at me curiously, but Bobbi knows what it means and gives me a meaningful glare.
“Okay, let’s start.” Ashley clears her throat and gestures for us to begin.
Bobbi turns to me. “Natalie contacted me earlier today. She’s interested in reconstructing her image after the People’s Choice Awards incident.”
They both stare at me, like they expect some big revelation.
I haven’t washed my hair in almost a week, have barely showered, and even dropped my phone in the toilet this morning. I don’t know what they expect from me. So I nod in agreement.
“Well,” Ashley says, once it’s clear they’re not getting anything else. She pushes her glasses up the bridge of her nose. “No drugs, no violence, no sex workers. This shouldn’t be too hard to deal with.”
I open and close my mouth, shooting a quick look at Bobbi. She seems unfazed.
“The bar isn’t very high, is it?” I frown. “I mean, I’m seventeen. Most of those things sound…not very possible for someone my age to be involved in—”
Ashley doesn’t blink. “You’d be surprised.”
“Okay, so it’s not quite that scandalous, it’s just…” I sigh, gazing at my sneakers. “It’s bad. Everyone’s making jokes online and they’re tagging me in all of that. They want me to see that they think I’m a joke.”
“Don’t be discouraged,” Ashley says. “There are no lawsuits working against us and no inappropriate pictures leaked. I can assure you that getting the public to respect you again is going to be a piece of cake.”
Right now, it doesn’t feel like a piece of cake.
Ashley turns to her assistant. “Christopher, are you taking notes?” He shows her his notebook, and she hums in acknowledgment before turning back to us. “Perfect. Is there anything at all we should know before developing your comeback strategy?”
“Um. I dropped my phone in the toilet this morning?” I offer.
Christopher looks confused, his pen hovering over the pad.
Bobbi clears her throat and pulls a few locs behind her shoulder. “I’ll ask my assistant to get you a new one. I think Ashley meant anything as in, have you contacted Trent? Has he contacted you? Does he have sensitive pictures or videos of you?”
I cringe. “Ew, no, no, and no. He’s dead to me.”
Which isn’t entirely true. But it feels way more dignified than saying that what really broke my heart and my phone was seeing him laughing at my expense along with the rest of the internet.
“Brilliant.” Ashley turns to Bobbi. “How are the charts?”
“Dipping, I’m afraid.” Bobbi passes her a closed folder. As Ashley starts going over some papers, Bobbi adds, “No longer number one. We lost ground this week, but I still think we can make a solid comeback if we focus on her image. She doesn’t need to release any new music so soon. She’s just got out of a world tour.”
“Of course. That wouldn’t be necessary.” Ashley closes the folder and hands it to Christopher, who reviews its contents. No one offers a folder to me. I’m about to ask whether my numbers are that bad when Ashley turns back to me with a crimson smile. “There are two ways we can do this, Natalie. You can give them something else to talk about, or we can build on your good-girl image. Send you to a third-world country so you can do some community work. People love charity.”
I sit up. My voice rising, I tell her, “Don’t say third-world country. It’s extremely elitist, and honestly, you’re putting yourself, as an American, above folks that have been colonized.”
By my side, I hear Bobbi whisper, “Brazilian.”
Ashley cocks an eyebrow. “I’m sorry, Natalie. I didn’t realize you were so political. If that’s your inclination, we can find a way for you to spend some time in Brazil, making sure you’re filmed and photographed there so your audience knows you care.”
“I— That’s not—that’s not what I said.” I feel my face flush.
We’re in a staring contest, Ashley and I, and the worst part is that I can tell she genuinely doesn’t mean any harm by what she’s saying. How do I tell her that I can be both outraged at her imperialist language and also not want to go back to my home country to do volunteer work with strangers instead of writing my music and living my life?
If I say that now, I’ll sound like an entitled jerk.
Bobbi breaks the awkward silence, clearing her throat in a way that makes us both look at her, and shakes her head. “No, that won’t do. I see your angle, but maybe keeping Natalie away from the spotlight while Trent is parading around with his new girlfriend would be detrimental to her image.”
“Quite the contrary, actually,” Ashley says. “Research shows that in situations like these, when the dumpee channels their humiliation into charitable acts, the public admires them and vilifies the person who left.”
There. Are. So. Many. Words. About. This. That. I. Hate.
From Bobbi calling Reese his new girlfriend to my receiving the title of dumpee, I am not loving the way this meeting is going.
“All right, so what’s the other option? The one about giving them something else to talk about?” I ask.
“Oh, of course. Your fan base is invested in your personal life. All we have to do is shake it up a little bit, as they say.” She does a horrifying shoulder shimmy that I assume represents shaking things up. I catch her assistant’s eyes, and we’re both scarred for life. Ashley leans forward in earnest. “All you need is a new boyfriend.”
I wait for Ashley to start laughing. She doesn’t.
Christopher has his head down again, taking notes. I sort of expected him to silently agree with me that this is weird.
Bobbi doesn’t say anything, either.
I stare at both women, my jaw hanging open.
“You can’t—you can’t expect me to get a rebound this quickly! How would I even go out and meet people? I’ll seem desperate! I already seem desperate enough, I just—I can’t do this. This is— No!”
Ashley seems confused; Bobbi actually chuckles.
Like this is funny.
This is not funny. I’m seriously about to question their credentials. I can’t be trusted to pee with my phone in my hands. How am I supposed to find someone to date?
“She doesn’t mean for real,” Bobbi says.
I narrow my eyes.
“Yes, obviously.” Ashley nods. “I’m talking about a fake relationship. We do it all the time to promote movies, TV shows, and so forth. Stir up a little drama to create media interest, making sales higher. This is a fairly common practice. We already have a standard ‘relationship’ non-disclosure agreement, and I have contacts I can pass on to Bobbi to choose from, so you can be sure it’s a suitable candidate. One who’ll benefit from the public exposure as much as you.”
Instead of being able to properly express how not down for this I am, all I can squeak out is a strangled little “That can’t be legal.”
Bobbi nods. “It is entirely legal. Another client I have—you’ll understand that I won’t disclose who—has recently gotten in a new relationship, but because he’s in a boy band and fans tend not to respect their privacy, he’s hired a team to shield the woman from the fans and spread rumors that he’s with numerous other ladies, so they won’t know what’s true.”
“That’s not—that’s not really the same,” I try.
But my protest is obviously in vain. They have both already made up their mind about how super totally normal and cool this is.
Ashley explains, “This is a very old trick, Natalie. Earlier this week I staged paparazzi catching a ‘couple’ stealing kisses o
utside a movie set. They don’t know each other that well, but they’re costars in the movie, so it’s excellent promo.”
I sigh. “Yeah, okay, but I just can’t do that.”
This time, the silence is like a bomb I couldn’t defuse in time. It blows up everyone’s expectations of me and my triumphant comeback.
They all want to see me shine—well, Christopher’s investment in my career is a little doubtful—and they probably think I’m being difficult. I hate the idea of pretending to like someone I don’t. I’ve had to pretend so much already. Pretend that my skin is hairless and smooth, that my hair is straight like an arrow. I’ve even lost parts of myself to keep pretending, like losing every hint of my accent in vocal practice. If I pretend to be in love with someone I don’t even know, won’t that be even worse?
I clear my throat awkwardly and get up. “I’m so sorry to waste everyone’s time. I’ll keep thinking of other strategies, okay?”
Although she still seems a little upset, Ashley gamely says, “We can rebuild your image in smaller ways. I’ll have my team work on a plan and send it to Bobbi as soon as possible. It just might take a little longer for the effects to show.”
I nod.
Bobbi stands as well and tells me, “Wait in the other room, all right? I have some things to discuss with Ashley, and you can have my assistant get you a new phone.”
I nod again. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be silly,” Bobbi says, and she kisses the top of my head.
It feels like I’ve let everyone down. Defeated, I force a smile, waving to Ashley and Christopher before I go, and leave the adults to it.
I’m a mess of nervous energy and fear that I’ve blown my one chance at a comeback when I stop at Linda’s desk on my way out.
Bobbi’s assistant is a white woman in her early thirties, with a face covered in freckles and a nineties sense of fashion. Linda is always nice to me in an impersonal kind of way that makes me think she’s not into pop music or celebrities, which has always made me wonder about her career choices.
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