Chapter 15

Brando

When I first started working in the music industry, the big labels were gatekeepers, standing at the gates of fame and fortune like saints passing down judgments. With a simple blessing they could induct you into the long, complicated process of pressing records, distribution, promotional campaigns, and corporate gigs. Or not.

Those days are long gone. As soon as the internet came along the gates shattered, and every wannabe, hack, and debutante rushed through. All of them scrabbling and fighting to stand out. But in order to make the jump from being another face in the crowd, another small-time also-ran, to being a really big star, you need to work every second of every day, push twice as hard as the next guy. You need to hustle – and it just so happens that I’m a natural.

For the next few days I go into overdrive. The first song I leaked, the acoustic track that was the first thing Haley recorded, got people’s ears immediately, and now the second one, a thrusting, dynamic, catchy song with a hook any bestselling artist would kill for, is the main event. The radio stations love it, and I send it to my connections in New York who embrace it just as eagerly, a double-pronged attack of airplay that spreads like wildfire from both coasts.

I bring in a talented photographer who owes me a favor (possibly for services rendered in the bedroom) to take some good shots of Haley, and bring in a couple of eager-to-please college kids to build her a new website and hook her into every music discovery, streaming, and social media service around. I post the music video in the morning and by lunchtime its views are in the six figure range, seven by dinner time. The ball is rolling, and all I have to do is maintain it.

I’m so busy that I barely have enough time to appreciate just how well it’s going. The only downside is that I’ve barely spoken to Haley herself in three days. Unless sending each other pictures of ourselves in the shower counts, but even there I’m starting to neglect my duties.

I have a meeting with a producer who wants to use her song in the closing credits of a teen drama that just wrapped filming, and when I get back to my car I pound the wheel and roar with fired-up enthusiasm. I’m gonna do this. And it’s going to be the greatest thing I’ve ever done.

Then Jax calls.

“Let me guess, you’re on your way,” he says.

It takes a full three seconds before I realize. “Oh shit! I’m sorry, dude.”

Jax laughs. “It’s cool. I only surf with you to scare off sharks anyway.”

“No, it’s not cool. I’m sorry, bro. I forgot you were back from Paris, and I’ve just been really busy.”

“Hey, forget it. There’s always Thursday.”

I mentally go over the rigorous schedule of promotions and networking I’ve got ahead of me for the next few days, as well as the time I need to carve out to see Haley again soon. “Yeah…I don’t know.”

“Still busy?”

I put the call onto the Porsche’s speakerphone and check the calendar on my phone.

“I don’t know. I have to see someone in the morning, and then I’ve got to make some calls. Shit.”

“I didn’t think you were that popular. Unless…Haley?”

“Yeah,” I say with a sigh. Even hearing her name makes me feel a little better.

Jax’s laugh is so easy and mild I can barely tell where the waves begin and his voice ends.

“You’re in deep with her. Shit. I knew it before you figured it out yourself.”

I laugh. He’s right.

“She’s something special, dude. I don’t know what it is, and that’s the weird thing about it. I always know what it is with women. She’s breaking big, and we’re doing this thing together. I don’t know… This is the first time in a long time everything feels like it’s falling into place.”

I hear nothing but the crashing waves over the phone.

“Bro?” I say, after waiting a few seconds. “You there?”

“Yeah. I’m here,” Jax says, his voice downturned and low.

“What?”

“Brando. Buddy…”

“Say it, dude.”

I hear him take a deep breath. “I don’t wanna sound like the Grim Reaper here. You’re overdue a good thing. Way overdue a girl who can keep you in check. But…she’s your act, you’re obviously really into her, she’s about to make it big… Doesn’t this feel familiar to you?”

I know what he’s talking about. Normally we don’t talk about my past with Lexi, the deal, the devastation – it’s off-limits and he knows it. It’s our code. I met Jax after the break-up, told him all about it one night when we decided to get drunk by ourselves rather than go home and bang chicks. I made him swear the next morning, when we woke up on the bar, never to mention what I told him ever again. I didn’t want to think about it. Didn’t want to go over it again. I wanted to be a new man, someone different. A man without that in his past. Jax acted like he couldn’t remember me telling him, did the only thing a decent friend would do. Until now.

“Familiar?” I push, daring Jax to break the code.

“Look, I don’t know her. Forget I said it. I’m just telling you to be careful. Friend to friend.”

“Yeah,” I say. “I’ll call you about Thursday.”

I hang up, drop the phone on the passenger seat, and stare ahead for a full ten minutes.

He’s right. It is familiar.

When I go to meet Haley, her friend Jenna from the coffee shop, and the stylist I finally convinced Haley to use, I’m coming with the best news yet. Our biggest chance, guaranteed to make her song a hit, if it wasn’t showing all the signs already.

And yet the memory of what Jax said earlier hangs over me like a dark mist I can’t shake off. This situation is familiar. I’m starting to see signs everywhere, in everything I do. The feeling of being almost there, the simple and strong trust I have in Haley, the adrenaline rush I get from seeing my work actually getting results – it’s word-for-word, motion-for-motion what I felt just before Lexi tore me apart. As soon as I set the ball in motion, it feels like it’s getting away from me. What seemed perfect before is now a little too perfect to trust.

Jenna sees me in the long, clean mirror of the hair salon as I walk up to her.

“We were waiting for you,” Jenna says, bringing Haley’s attention to me.

“Heeeey!” she says, smiling wide and bright with her face, but keeping her head in place as the bald guy in a tight shirt snips and chops at it.

“Hey you. Good to see you, Jenna,” I say. I should step through and kiss her, make the bald guy stop so that I can plant a long, slow kiss on those lips. But I don’t, and Haley notices, even though she barely shows it.

“Thank you so much for letting me in on this, Brando,” Jenna says. “I’ve needed a makeover, like, forever.”

“Hardly,” I scoff. “You’re already flawless, both of you. But I’m glad you’re enjoying.” I glance at Haley. “You need strength to get to the top. But you need strong friends to stay there.”

“I got more clothes today than I have in the past two years,” Haley says, before winking. “I’ll show you if you’re free tonight.”

I smile just enough not to set off her alarm bells, but it takes a lot of effort.

“Actually I’m not.”

Haley pouts.

“And neither are you,” I continue.

“What do you mean?” Haley says, frowning for a second before the bald guy adjusts her head slightly. “I thought the next studio session was tomorrow afternoon?”

“It’s not a studio session.”

“Well, what, then? Quit teasing this out!”

“Yeah, Brando!” Jenna adds for good measure.

I pause a little before answering.

“You’re on Conan.”

Their jaws drop at the same time, and they turn to look at each other slowly at the same time, mirror images.

Then they scream.

The bald guy leaps back, palms out like Haley just combusted in front of him, before turning to me with a glare as if I caused it. I shrug, and the next thing I know Haley’s pressing up against me, hair-filled bib still wrapped around her shoulders, insatiable tongue between my lips.

I try to be cold. Try to be smart. Try to keep myself from putting my arms around her and pressing my lips back on hers. But it doesn’t work. I can’t. Haley’s nothing like Lexi. This is nothing like before. I’ve never felt so good. This time it’s real, and I’m gonna do it the only way I know how – by putting everything I have on the line.