Chapter 18. Brooke

Chapter 18

Brooke

Rowena and I don’t make eye contact as she shuffles through first class on her way to coach, her bag of camera equipment weighing her skinny shoulder into a sharp downward slope. She looks like a lop-sided scarecrow. I can easily imagine her slipping into narrow, impossible spaces, getting shots the large, aggressive men of her kind—the ones who scare the crap out of celebs with their obnoxious belligerence—could never get. The only thing unnerving about Rowena is her eyes. They’re not empty like some psycho killer—they’re just flat-out ruthless.

Not that I can talk.

She generally doesn’t have to leave the LA area to make a living, but she understands the strategic part of doing personal favors for the right people, and I’m one of those people. Graham and I may not be A-listers, but we’re close enough to make news if the story is juicy, especially with the movie premiere a couple of weeks away. I’ve made it clear to Rowena that this favor is non-negotiable if she expects a continuance of tips like the Reid-n-Emma bonus that probably paid several months’ rent. I’m paying her airfare and hotel, plus she’ll be compensated for the photos themselves.

Now all I have to do is get Graham into the picture.

I hate long flights alone because there’s nothing to do. God knows I’m not going to chat up the middle-aged CEO or whatever he is sitting next to me. He reminds me of my dad—from the stereotypical Rolex and custom-made suit to the trainer-maintained body and bleached teeth.

Daddy dearest is on his fourth marriage to someone too young for him. As I get older, they’re getting closer and closer to my age. I just turned twenty—how can he be okay with the fact that his newest Mrs. Cameron is five or six years older than his youngest daughter? I think my oldest sister is actually her same age. You’d think he’d at least have the awareness to be embarrassed.

My mother was the idiot second wife—the younger woman who attracted a powerful married man away from his wife and two daughters and got knocked up with me, probably on purpose. By the time his divorce was settled and the pre-nup my unwitting mother agreed to was inked, I was a month old. Inexplicably, I was in their farcical wedding photos (which my mother filed through the shredder when my father left her for wife number three—hello, who didn’t see that coming? ). Why didn’t either of them think I’d eventually grow old enough to look at those framed photos and figure out that I’m beyond illegitimate, or that my friends wouldn’t come to the same conclusion?

Mom is currently prowling for Husband Number Four. Number Two, Rick, was actually okay. I sort of miss him. Number Three was a huge douche and I was more than happy to get my own apartment in LA when Mom moved back to Texas with him—good riddance. She now says that her third marriage was the “fifteen minute” variety. In actuality it lasted around a year, but maybe fifteen minutes just refers to how long either of them remained faithful.

Mr. CEO keeps peering at me, and I’m not sure if it’s because of my hot little LA body or if he actually recognizes me. I don’t particularly care. Grabbing the satin sleep mask, I shove it on, lean my seat back and settle in to pretend sleep. I don’t want to contemplate forty-something lechers, or my parents and their meaningless relationship histories. I just want to think about Graham.

I don’t want to screw this up. I know I’m about to manipulate him in deplorable ways, but I’m a practical girl. The ends justify the means. This is something my parents have never, in either of their pathetic lives, done—plan for the future, rather than living in the moment. Graham is not a momentary whim, though I admit he was at first. But that was a very long time ago. I’ve known for a while now that he’s exactly the kind of stable guy I need. He’s one of only two people in the world I can comfortably talk to about what happened with Reid.

God, Reid. What a tortuous mess that was.

When we met, he was fourteen, and I was fifteen. Both of us were recurring extras on the set of a soon-to-be-canceled sitcom. I’d catch him staring at me sometimes and he’d blush, or vice versa. I thought he was the most beautiful boy I’d ever seen. We talked a few times, but in short, nervous sentences on meaningless subjects—not in any substantial way.

Then, a month later, we both managed to land minor parts in the same movie. It was like fate, in a way—though to what purpose, I have no idea.

The cast was on location in Idaho, living in trailers. With no one else our age around, Reid and I had our tutoring sessions together, and we grew close fast. Our parents were too uninvolved to be around much, and the notion that production babysits underage kids is ludicrous. Yes, we were somewhat separated from the older cast mates because that sort of slipup would spell legal disaster, but for Reid and me the situation was akin to being thrown into the same playpen. We could mess around with each other all we wanted to. And we did.

I’d moved to LA with Mom when she married Rick, and the sitcom had been my first acting job. When the movie Reid and I were filming was over and we were back in LA, we kept seeing each other. Neither of us was old enough to drive, but we were privileged kids of clueless parents. We hired cars and hung out frequently at each other’s houses, which weren’t too far apart.

We were too young and irresponsible to be sexually active, but eventually, going all the way felt like a natural progression. Reid looked at me like I was a goddess come to life in his bedroom. He was reverent and adoring. I loved the feel of my hair spread across his pillow and his weight pressing into me and the expression on his face when he stared into my eyes and whispered, “I love you. ”

God, we were stupid. We used protection most of the time, but occasionally we’d forget, especially if we’d been drinking. Reid resisted drinking with me most of the time, or he’d have one beer or one shot and quit. Something to do with his mother. And then came the night of the screwdrivers. We must have downed half a bottle of vodka between us, and we were both violently sick most of the night. The next morning, his dad discovered us in his room, passed out and hungover. After delivering a harsh parental lecture, his dad called my mom.

Loving mother that she is, she sent a car around to collect me. (Had she even noticed that I never came home the previous night? Who knows. )

When I staggered through the door, the only thing she asked—derision in her tone, not concern—was if I needed a morning-after pill. The last thing I wanted to appear was dumber than my mom. “Of course not, ” I told her, trailing my hands along the hallway walls on the way to my room. “We use protection. ”

She narrowed her eyes at me, and if she’d had any sense she’d have never believed me. Instead, she snapped, “You don’t get to be all high-and-mighty just because you know how to use a rubber, missy. ”

“Why the hell not? ” I returned, my head throbbing. “If you’d known how to use one, I wouldn’t be here to bother you. ”

She slapped me then, and it wasn’t like seeing stars, it was like sparks erupting and everything blacking out at the edges. Rick rushed in and said That’s enough, Sharla and steered her out of my room as I stumbled onto the bed. He came back minutes later with ice chips and pain pills. My ears were still ringing when he sighed, “Just sleep it off, Brooke. You’ll feel better later. ” In his kind eyes was the concern missing in my mother’s. He was weighing something he never got a chance to say, because Mom began calling his name in that petulant tone. Patting my arm, he sighed and left the room.

She preferred me to be invisible to him. I was starting to look like a woman, and all of a sudden, I was a rival, or at least something conceivably prettier than her. She didn’t like it.

I don’t remember what Reid and I fought over the night we broke up. We’re so similar that if we both happened to be in a pissy mood at the same time, we would inevitably end up in a vicious argument. At first, he seemed shocked at the things I’d say, trying to hurt him, to get a reaction. But his temper was as bad as mine—he just had a longer fuse. When he’d finally lose it, we would say cruel, spiteful things to each other and accuse each other of all manner of sins.

I confess that making him that angry was a turn-on at times. If I could get him to lose it and then rein him in at just the right moment, the passion he unleashed was insane. He’d pin me to the bed and kiss me so hard it hurt, choking back his anger and redirecting it gratefully to something more satisfying than screaming obscenities at each other.

Sometimes I missed the mark and pushed him too far. That night was one of those. And then, for the first time, he didn’t call me an hour later, crying. That reaction from him always made me cry, too, and we’d blubber apologies and reaffirm our love and the need to see each other even if it was 3 a. m.

I waited, but he never called. Two days later, I was in a panic. I didn’t want to call first and appear weak, but I was breaking down. I missed him. I wanted his forgiveness. I also wanted him to need me more than anything, and if he was staying away, that wasn’t the case.

So I went out to a club with a couple of costars from the last film—girls in their early twenties who felt sorry for my little fifteen-year-old breakup woes. I had no problem passing myself off as legal with the right makeup, clothes, attitude, and a top-notch fake ID. Being fawned over by older guys didn’t help like I thought it would, though.

I was close to grabbing a taxi to Reid’s house and begging his forgiveness when I noticed a guy with a camera. Failing in his attempt to be subtle, he was hiding behind a post that didn’t quite conceal his girth. I knew he’d be spotted and shown the door any second. As he zeroed in on my friends, I decided on a different, stronger course of action. I would make Reid crazy with jealousy, and then he’d come back to me.

I found a hot guy, pulled him onto the dance floor and performed every degrading dirty dancing move I could think of on him. I incorporated things I’d seen my mom do on the stripper pole she had installed in the extra bedroom for “exercise, ” and the photog recorded it all. Reid and I weren’t big time, but we were cute together, and Hollywood liked us. I had no idea that being idolized also meant people were salivating over the moment we’d split up and how it would happen. I was just desperate to make Reid cave first.

The article online the next day made me out to be the biggest whore imaginable—so sad, she’s so young—while Reid was cast as the naï ve boy who had no idea what his slutty girlfriend had been doing behind his back.

Out that night, and the next, and the next, Reid was photographed leaving clubs, parties and hot spots with a swarm of different girls until there was no doubt in my mind that we were done and he was over me.

I cried for two weeks. I barely ate. I couldn’t sleep. I wanted to call and tell him I hadn’t been with anyone else, that it was all a ruse. But I was hurt and resentful, knowing that was no longer true for him. My mother, fresh into her separation from Rick, sat me down and told me that the only way to get over a guy like that is to get a new one. I heeded her advice, but couldn’t settle down to any one guy. And I couldn’t exorcise Reid from my head.

That’s when I met Graham, who resisted and spurned me. No one rejected me, not when I was offering straight up no-strings screwing around. We were on location not too far from LA, just beginning to film a movie. I’d known Graham for a week, and I already detested him for his high-handed dismissal.

And then I figured out that it had been a while since I’d had a period. I peed on a stick and was stunned to find out I was pregnant. Abortion? No problem. Sign me up. Until the doctor said how far along I was—almost ten weeks.

Which meant it was Reid’s. Absolutely Reid’s. I told them I couldn’t do it. Not when my mother pleaded with me not to ruin my career. Not when my father was called in to order me to comply (because yeah, that’s always worked on me).

“I’ve made the appointment, and we’re going tomorrow, ” Mom said, as though I had no opinion in the matter.

“Be a good girl and listen to your mother, ” my father added.

I hated them both.

Graham heard me crying in my trailer that night, and knocked on the door. I don’t know why, but I took one look at those warm brown eyes and I told him everything.

Holding me while I cried, he told me that he and his ex-girlfriend were having a baby in a few months. She was planning to hand it to him and walk away, but he was hoping for a reconciliation.

“Brooke, this might be the most important decision you ever make. It doesn’t matter if you didn’t plan this—there’s a choice to make, and you should make it. Decide what’s right for you, whatever that is, and then do it. ”

No one had ever said that to me before, and here was this boy, who wasn’t quite a year older than me, sounding so wise and sure. Of course, I know now that in that moment, Graham still had completely undeserved faith in Zoe, so he wasn’t exactly the soul of discernment he appeared to be. Still, he had a point about taking over the decisions for your own life. That was the moment I started doing just that.

If I’m capable of loving anyone, it has to be Graham.

The ends justify the means, right? The ends justify the means.

Me: I’m in town for a couple of days. Meetings over that fall project. Dinner?

Graham: Bad week. I’ve got finals and papers due through friday. When are you leaving?

Me: Early friday. : (

Graham: Damn, not the sad face! I could maybe get away for an hour or so tomorrow?

Me: Yes please! : ) Text me your address and I’ll pick you up at eight.

*** *** ***

REID

Brooke: We’re having dinner tomorrow night. Photos should be up thursday. Make sure she sees them.

Me: Yep

Brooke: That answer doesn’t leave me with warm fuzzies

Me: Are you capable of warm fuzzies? I’m thinking cold ice shards.

Brooke: Do you ever STFU??

Me: Quit freaking out. I’ll handle it.

***

Emma and I are on our second day of local television morning show interviews. These are like an annoying, unnecessary rehearsal for the ones that matter—the nationally syndicated talk shows, the late night network and cable shows.

Most of these local morning anchors will never make it out of their thirties in front of a camera, especially the women. Not because they can’t do the job, but because there’s always some fresh-faced, ambitious twenty-something who wants that job, will take less to do it, and will look hotter doing it. No wonder some of them look at Emma and me like they’d give anything to just punch us in the face.

I may be exaggerating a bit.

This morning, though, the female anchor is interrogating Emma as though she’s personally responsible for a host of swept-under-the-rug hate crimes. Leaning so far forward that Emma moves closer to me, Wynona narrows her overly-lined, heavily-mascaraed eyes. “Emma, you can’t tell me there isn’t something going on between you two. Look at the photographic evidence! ”

Without her eyes ever leaving Emma’s face, she points to a huge monitor in between her chair and our small sofa. I stifle a laugh. The cell phone photo I suspect Brooke of taking during Walt’s show? Really? Everyone saw and picked apart that photo, months ago. “Um…” Emma says, and I lean up, chuckling slightly.

“Wynona. ” My voice is like honey and her attention swings to me. Professional thirty-something women aren’t quite sure how to react when I take such a familiar, somewhat condescending tone. “That’s a really old, really fuzzy photo. ” I shrug. “As we’ve said in previous interviews, the whole cast got along really well during filming. We were all very close. ” When Emma almost turns to look at me, I press my knee against hers and she freezes in place. Good girl.

“Reid, I believe you had an old flame in the cast, as well? ” Wynona clicks the device in her palm and the photo on the wall is suddenly a four-years-younger me, leading Brooke by the hand as we leave some LA hotspot. Both of us are smiling—me, right into the camera, and Brooke, looking at me. I haven’t seen this photo in a very long time.

“Yes. ” My smile is similar to that of the boy on the screen, if Wynona doesn’t look closely enough. That boy is not yet the uncaring bastard sitting in front of her.

She scoots an inch closer. “Were you and Ms. Cameron in contact between your tween romance and the filming of School Pride? ” I can tell from her cold eyes she knows damned well we weren’t tweens in that photo, but I ignore her pointless taunt.

“Sure, ” I lie.

Ignoring me, she asserts, “Because there are rumors that the two of you had—issues—on the set of your recent film. ”

I laugh complacently and match her icy gaze. “There’s a reason they’re called rumors, right? ”

She looks like she wants to bite me. And not in a good way. “What about now? Do you consider yourselves to be—friendly—now? ”

What a bitch. I decide to throw her a fast ball, which turns out to have perfect timing. “Yeah. We hung out this past weekend, in fact. ”

Thank God I’m occasionally truthful, because just as I admit this, she click-clicks and up pops a photo from three days ago in which I’m entering Brooke’s apartment. She’s clearly visible in the doorway, admitting me. I wonder if Brooke knows about this. I wonder if she even set it up with that photog girl she has on payroll. How else would this shot get into the exclusive hands of a common local news station when Star or Us would have paid a shitload of cash for it?

Wynona’s faç ade crumbles a little at the edges at losing the element of surprise, but she rallies and turns back to Emma. “So if you and Reid aren’t involved… is this due to your involvement with a—” she glances at a card “—Marcus Hoffpauer? ”

The photo on the wall changes to Emma looking bored to death, arms crossed, standing next to that conceited prick at his prom. That must have been a pity date.

Emma is speechless, so I laugh and gesture to the photo, grinning conspiratorially at her. “Ah, I remember this—the community theatre guy, right? ”

Emma nods, her lips compressing when she glances at the photo. “Yes, at his prom. ”

I shake my head, smiling and staring daggers into Wynona. “If he wanted to score points, he could have—I don’t know—introduced her to his friends? That’s what we do when we invite non-celeb friends to our parties. ” A glance at Emma makes it clear that she’s grateful for my interruption.

I turn and give Wynona a mesmerizing smile. “So, about School Pride. We’re both really excited about the upcoming release and ready to talk about the film. We brought several clips—I assume we can show your viewing audience a couple of them now? ”

***

Emma breathes out a deep sigh the moment we shut the car doors and I start the engine, letting it idle and purr for a moment. “Wow, her face…” Her mouth turns up on one side. “I kind of expected her head to start spinning around at one point. ”

Wynona was tough, but I’ve had more hostile question-answer sessions than that. No need to pass that info on to Emma, though. “Courtesy never works with people like her, so I don’t bother. If you want to shift topics, you have to force it. With a smile and an angelic look, of course. ”

“Of course. ”

We pull into traffic and I’m glad for the heavily tinted windows. The last thing either of us needs right now is more public scrutiny. “You looked miserable at that prom. Anyone talk to you at all? ”

Shrugging, she says, “The waiters were nice. ” I laugh and she gives me a grim smile in return, her head angled. “How did you know? I mean, practically everyone fell for the story that I’m so conceited that I wouldn’t lower myself to speak to regular people. ”

I make a disgusted sound. “Please. You’re one of the least conceited people I know. Your best friend is a non-celeb girl—that’s evidence enough that you’re not above mingling with commoners. ”

She smirks and I smirk back.

“Let me guess—you told him you’re moving across the country to go to school, so you can’t imagine a relationship between you going anywhere—something like that—and he got pissed. I wouldn’t be surprised if he wanted you to give him a leg up in the industry and he saw his chance at that falling away. ”

She blinks in surprise, and her hands open on her lap. “I can’t blame him for being disappointed about that, if that was the case. ”

I’m shaking my head before she stops talking. “Why should he put forth no more effort than cozying up to the right girl? Yes, there’s a lot of luck and who-you-know, but we both had to work like hell to become successful actors. We didn’t just get it handed to us. Even if you are planning to toss it all aside to become an ordinary little co-ed. ”

She clears her throat, a light blush across her cheeks.

In the silence, I begin ruminating over John’s usual phenomenal luck holding steady with that underaged girl. Once I was gone and he got her to wake up, she was more than happy to be given cab fare to get to a friend’s house so her parents wouldn’t find out she was at some strange guy’s apartment overnight.

“I’m 99 percent sure we all passed out when we got to my place, ” John said.

“What about the other one percent? ”

John sighs, passing on a rare piece of insight. “Dude, I hope we never have daughters. ”

My best friend doesn’t know about the possible kid with Brooke. I love John, but unlike Brooke, I don’t trust anyone with that information. Thanks to her, Emma and Graham both know about it.

“Do you mind if I ask you about your relationship with Brooke? ” Emma asks. I’m glad she can’t see my eyes behind these shades. I mean damn, does she read minds? “You don’t have to tell me anything. It’s not my business. But you guys weren’t friendly a few months ago and now you’re, uh, hanging out together. ”

I shrug, exiting the freeway in a split-second decision that will keep her with me a little longer today. “You know that old photo of us that Wynona put up this morning? ” She nods. “I guess I can’t blame either of those kids for what they did back then. Growing up in the spotlight, as you know, isn’t all that easy to handle. ”

“So, you’re what—friends—now? ” I can’t blame her for being incredulous. The idea of Brooke and me ever being friends is ludicrous. She glances out her window and adds, “And where are we, by the way? ”

I chuckle. “We’re stopping for breakfast tacos at this very authentic place I know. And let’s just say Brooke and I have reached an understanding. ”

Her brow knits as she takes in the East LA scenery. “Is this a safe spot for us to stop? ”

“This car is like the Batmobile. It’s bulletproof. ”

She peers at me. “Is that true? ”

“Um…” I laugh at her gullibility and she swats my arm.

Pulling into a patchy, fissured parking lot and trying to avoid the potholes, I park and pull out my cell. Emma stares at the row of multi-ethnic businesses while I make a short call. With a limited Spanish vocab stemming from a lifetime of Hispanic caregivers and housekeepers, I request my usual order, doubled. Five minutes later, a tattooed guy in a wife-beater and a loosely-tied apron exits the restaurant storefront with a paper bag and two coffees. He makes a beeline in our direction. The Lotus would stand out in this lot even if it wasn’t yellow.

My window slides down noiselessly. “Gracias, Raul, ” I say, passing the coffees to Emma and swapping a twenty for the bag.

Raul pockets the money and tips his chin up once, murmuring, “De nada, ” before sauntering back inside.

Handing off the cream containers and sugar packets to Emma, I unwrap one of the small stuffed tortillas, suddenly starving. I’ve already finished one and am starting another while she’s mixing her coffee. By the time I’m backing out, I’ve finished a second burrito and Emma is taking her first tentative bite.

“Good? ”

She nods. “Potato? And—? ”

“Cabrito. ” I hope she doesn’t know what that is.

Her brow furrows. “Is that… goat? ”

Damn. “I said it was authentic…” She doesn’t look too disgusted. “Not as bad as tuna, huh? ” I remind her of our first official onscreen kiss. MiShaun had admonished me for eating tuna sandwiches beforehand, and I’d played cool about it in front of them and then sprinted to my PA and demanded a toothbrush and toothpaste before we did the scene.

Emma laughs while finishing her bite, holding a hand over her mouth. “I can’t believe you remember that. ”

My answer is an indirect smile and nothing more, because all I’m remembering right now is the sweetness of her kiss. Brooke can’t get her half of this insane arrangement completed quickly enough for me.