Track 03: Kansas City Shuffle
“All the world wants is drama. They’ve pulled out all their tricks.
No choice left but bait-and-switch. This is the only fix.”
Present
BEING FAMOUS MEANT THAT EYES were always on you. Being famous meant that your every move was watched, everything you said was documented and written in stone, and that you had zero time for yourself. Being famous meant that your life was constantly for someone… everyone… else. There was an unimaginable love and an unfaltering obligation. But there was also a seed of regret—wishing it could bloom into a solitary life where actions and choices were all your own.
Being famous was like being a parent… to six billion children.
All kicking, screaming, and desperate to follow you into the bathroom and publicize every last shred of your privacy… and your sanity.
No matter what I looked like—sloppy clothes, fancy clothes, makeup, gas mask… they could still pick me out. My fans. Blake’s Babes. Not only could they pick me out, but I could pull a full-blown Britney Spears and shave my head and half the world would follow suit. I could see the hashtags now… #yolo #blakedown
Unfaltering obligation to stay sane.
Even people who weren’t my fans looked at me as they walked down the aisle of the plane searching for their seats, whispering to their travel partner or immediately reaching for their phone to text their friends.
And yes, it was obvious when they were not really calling someone, instead faking it in an attempt to secretly take a picture of me. Yes, it was obvious when they pretended to hold their phone nonchalantly down by their leg even though it’s angled up and their finger is pressing furiously on the side button to snap a pic.
I didn’t mind photos. I enjoyed the photos. I enjoyed talking to my fans. I enjoyed being a person and not some untouchable creature that only deserved to be admired from afar. They could have just asked.
“We already have our tickets to see you in Nashville at the end of your tour!” A frazzled mom gushed as I signed two United napkins for her to give to her daughters.
“Oh, I’m so excited!” I said with a smile even though my mind was around a thousand miles up in the air thinking about what said tour was turning into.
“Thank you so much!” she said, clutching the napkins to her chest as the line began moving again, taking her back down the aisle to her seat.
They always booked Tay and I in first class even though I told them I was fine to ride in coach. Maybe in coach, no one would be looking for me. Bruce insisted that—again—it was all part of my image. Plus, ‘did I really want my entire flight to be disrupted with requests for photos and autographs?’ I laughed to myself. The sad excuse for a barrier between first class and coach was zero deterrent to stop Blake Tyler’s Babe Squad; the Babes were relentless.
I plastered a small smile on my face, patiently waiting for Tay to finish unpacking all of her in-flight essentials (Kindle, blanket, neck pillow, and tiny Moscow Mule cocktail kit) so that I could talk to her; needing time to process, I hadn’t said much on the ride to the airport.
What I did mind, I thought as I listened to the muted conversations around us, was when people thought I lived in my own little celebrity bubble where their words, when said just a few feet from me, couldn’t get to me—couldn’t hurt me.
“Did you see the hot flight attendant back there?” I heard two teen girls gossiping in a half-whisper.
“Wait until the end of the flight, Elle. Blake Tyler’s sitting right over there which means she’ll probably date him and dump him before the plane lands. Then you’ll be able to swoop in and pick up the pieces.”
“Shh, Andrea! I think she heard you! God, you’re such a bitch.” They both broke into muffled laughter.
Heat rushed to my face and I turned away from the aisle, trying not to let them see how their words stung or the way I had to swallow down the sudden urge to cry.
At the end of the day—and written on my grave—was that I cared too much. I didn’t want to admit what another break-up cost me. I was the superstar. The celebrity. The sweetheart of the nation who hadn’t let fame go to her head. I was the It-Girl.
And the headlines lately were a giant slap in the face. ‘Too many boyfriends.’ ‘Too many dates.’ And how I ‘can’t make them stay.’
Slap.
Slap.
Slap.
I was tired of reading what people say. Yes, I dated them all. Guilty as charged. But I wasn’t trying to play with their hearts.
Maybe Bruce and Tay were right… Maybe this was a lot worse than I thought. I was the Princess of Pop whose castle had crumbled overnight.
“Ok,” Tay said with a huff, finally relaxing back in the seat. “I think I’m good.”
“You’d think after all the flights we’ve taken that you would have this down to a much finer science,” I grumbled, reaching in my purse for a piece of Trident, pulling out all four boxes of gum that I had stashed in there. A sad testimony to my nervous habit.
“I do have it down to a science; it just takes time,” she said with a sweet smile, getting her cocktail kit ready as the other female first-class attendant came over and asked if we wanted anything to drink.
“I can’t believe you’re on board with this,” I began softly.
She reached over and squeezed my hand. “You know I wouldn’t be if I thought there was any other way.”
“Yeah, well, for the record, if the Titanic is sinking, then you’re Rose for relegating me to the frigid ocean when there was definitely room for two on that board,” I said with a strangled laugh.
“Seriously. How am I going to do this?” I popped another bubble.
How was I going to survive this?
“Well, asking him would be a good start,” she said flipping open the cover on her Kindle.
“Nope.” I reached over and grabbed the thing from her hand. “Don’t even think of disappearing on me right now. What do you mean, ‘ask him?’ Like ‘Oh hey, Zach. Remember me? The girl who dry humped you in the treehouse and then sang a lame-ass song about you at your own graduation party?’ I swear, Franklin is the only town in the whole US where I’m not famous—I’m infamous.”
She rolled her eyes. “Well, I wouldn’t say that.” Tay took her drink from the attendant, continuing as she added in her fixings, “Look, that was like… ten… nine years ago; that’s a long time. Now, you are world famous. People would literally do anything to meet you—let alone go on tour with you—and I think that’s what you need to focus on: that you aren’t the only one benefitting here. Opening for you for Every. Single. Show. in the States is huge. Like career-making huge.”
I took a deep breath, sighing back into my seat as the plane began to lift off the ground.
“Yeah,” I agreed, “but he still has to pretend to fall in love with me. God, he couldn’t even pretend to like me when we were younger. And now, I haven’t seen him in so long—at least two years. Was this really the best plan you could come up with?” I groaned.
“B, trust me, I wouldn’t have dared to mention the Z-word if it wasn’t,” she paused as the captain announced, ‘Our flight time is two hours and forty minutes to touchdown in Nashville where it’s a brisk ten degrees outside.’
“But we are in damage control here,” she continued with a sigh, “and he’s the only person with the background and situation who is most likely able to pull this off. So, take off your rear-views, put on your big girl panties, and remember that you are offering him not only the opportunity of a lifetime, but also a chance to let the world think he’s hooked up with the hottest pop-star on the planet.”
“Oh, God,” I moaned, burying my face in my hands. This was such a bad idea.
“It’s simple. You ask Zach. Even if he says no, once you tell your brother, he won’t let Zach pass up the opportunity; it’s the break that will get ZPP launched and Ash will be all over that,” she said with such dramatic emphasis that I almost wanted to ask what she meant. “I hate to say it, but you’re really not giving him an option. So, just make it as business-like as possible and it won’t be that awkward.”
Tay didn’t know—she didn’t know what Zach did to me. Talking to him had always been a perpetual tongue-twister that I could never get right no matter how she coached me.
No, I could do this, I pep-talked myself, closing my eyes as Taylor went back to the latest Fifty Shades book on her Kindle.
It had been exactly two years since I’d seen him; I didn’t want Tay to know how exactly I remembered these things. My brother and Zach had come home for the holiday. They’d moved back after graduation—not back to Franklin, but into downtown Nashville. My brother, using his business degree, had been dabbling in several start-ups in the city as well as being the quasi-manager for Zach’s band, the Zach Parker Project. And Zach, well, he’d left football when he’d left Alabama and immersed himself in the music scene.
Two years ago, my mom called me after one of my recording sessions and told me that Ash was bringing Zach to the house for Christmas Eve dinner. After blaming my momentary shock on a poor cell connection, I brushed it off like it was going to be no big deal. It had been a long time. I should have known better.
I walked into my parents dining room for Christmas Eve dinner with the confidence of being famous and currently dating one of the stars of the TV show, Vampire Journals. (It also helped that I’d crimped my long blonde hair, done my makeup, and wore a tight, fancy number that had been a Grammy-option reject.) It was a confidence that faltered when I saw Zach for the first time since their college graduation. He was still as devastatingly gorgeous as the day he devastated me. Fueled by the need to rub my current fairytale in his face, I sat at the table and went on and on (and on) about Jake, only to have Ash snicker at me and ask why, if the guy was so great, hadn’t I written a song about him yet?
I was dumbstruck. He’d meant it lightly (because I did sometimes write songs about my boyfriends), but only after the words came out did he realize it sounded like he was bringing up their high school party—and my song to Zach—again. My face burned as my mouth opened and shut like I was a goldfish waiting to be fed something that would make the moment less humiliating.
After the long moment of silence to mourn the last shreds of my self-confidence, Ash mumbled an apology and started a conversation about how ZPP was really picking up popularity with a lot of larger venues in Nashville—and Zach jumped right in, just as eager to forget that moment. I barely spoke the rest of the meal, once again, humiliated about my feelings for Zach right in front of him.
That was my fear. That this request was going to be one more humiliation.
Closing my eyes, I immediately returned to the ending of that memory.
“Seriously, Ash? What the fuck man?” Zach’s tight and irritated voice rasped.
I’d walked back into the dining room to grab the rest of the plates and overheard Zach and my brother talking in the living room next door.
“Chill, bro. It was just a slip. It’s fine,” my brother said with a laugh.
“Yeah, well, when your little sister writes a goddamn love song about me, it’s not just a slip.”
“Christ, I would hope she’s fucking over that by now,” Ash grumbled, “the way she’s going on about what’s-his-name.”
“Another reason why we should go,” Zach said tightly.
“It’s all over the news. There’s no way she made up the damn boyfriend just to get your attention even though that’s sure as shit what it sounded like.”
I wanted to punch my brother—partially for throwing me under the bus but mostly because he was one-hundred-percent right. Not that I made Jake up. But that I brought him up for Zach’s attention.
“Let’s go,” Zach replied. “I can’t be around her anymore.”
I jerked back, the plates in my hands clattering against one another just as sure as if he’d struck me. My stomach rolled with the need to vomit and I just prayed I didn’t drop the plates as I ran back into the kitchen with black spots still clouding my vision.
That night, I jotted down the names of every song that ended up on the Lovestruck album, bits and pieces of verses and refrains flashing in front of my eyes.
He was the reason for them all. And he was the reason for the teardrops on my guitar.
I jerked my eyes to the window, hating how I went back to that December all the time…
Well, not all the time, but more than I should.
A small patch of turbulence shook me back to the present and I chewed nervously on the now flavorless piece of gum.
Remember, Blake, you have two more Grammys under your belt since then. Another platinum album. A star on the Boulevard. You are better than this stupid crush. Stop letting it cripple you.
Grabbing my iPad from my bag, I pulled my hair back into a ponytail and out of my face. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw that Tay was already napping. Popping in my earbuds, I threw on some classical music to focus my thoughts on what exactly I was going to say. There was no winging this one; there was no way he could say no.
‘Hey, Zach. Here’s the deal… I’ll make you famous if you save my reputation.’
Or maybe: ‘Hey, Zach. So, I was wondering if you would consider being my fake boyfriend while I’m on tour? In exchange, I’ll let your band open every show. By the way, you know how I wrote that song for you one time? Yeah, well, this whole album may or may not be about you…’
‘Hey, Zach. If I bribe you with everything that you’ve ever wanted, do you think you could love me then?’
I was pathetic.
“We’re all so excited that you’re ending your tour in Nashville,” my mom, Alison Tyler, gushed as we checked on the lasagna that was heating up in the oven. I’d confined myself and my anxiety to the kitchen leaving Taylor to set the table while we waited for my brother and Zach to get here.
“Yeah, it was originally shoved in the middle of the schedule, but then we bumped it to the end,” I replied, grating some parmesan cheese into a bowl and sneaking a few bites for myself. Cheese and Christmas cookies were my weaknesses.
“And everything’s been going ok?” she asked, concern seeping into her warm, caring voice, and I immediately knew where this was going—as if I needed one more reminder about my failing love life.
I loved my parents—and my brother—more than anything. I’d never played up the ‘small-town girl’ or ‘all-American family’ catch-phrases; they were just the truth.
My mom always called me before every performance (no matter what time it meant she had to wake up) and my dad always made sure that I took time off between touring and recording to come home, regroup, and eat a whole pot of his famous chili. This place was my rock, my safe space, no matter where in the world I was or what I was doing. They brought me back from the lights and the fame and the all-too-real and all-too-fake dichotomy of the entertainment scene.
“I know better than to believe the tabloids, but I thought you really liked that DJ,” she said quietly. I’d called her from Europe to tell her about the breakup but I hadn’t really told her why, too frustrated with myself—yet again—for picking another dud.
“He was a jerk,” I mumbled, softly, setting the grater in the sink before I couldn’t help but add, “They all are.”
“I’m sorry, honey,” she empathized, putting an arm around my shoulder. “You’ll find somebody. I know you will.” Yeah, ok. “Maybe finding him on tour isn’t the best thing. I know how much you love tours and performances and meeting all your fans, but I also know how much it takes out of you and sometimes I think you forget that you are only twenty-five. And human. You don’t have to always be what they want; it’s ok to just be you.”
I bit back a groan as she pulled me close. If only she knew what I had to do tonight. And no, I hadn’t forgotten that I was only human—it was the world who apparently did—who thought I’d become this heartless black widow, eating up boyfriends like they were Grammys.
My head jerked with a nod as I picked up the bowl of cheese and headed for the dining room, needing Tay and a change of topic.
Instead, I walked through the swinging door to find myself face-to-face with that god who’d created a fire inside of my soul and burned my heart to the ground.
I’d stood on stage in front of tens of thousands of people. I’d walked up and accepted Grammys after being told that I was too young to deserve them. I sang my heart out for millions of people all over the world and yet, I’d never felt nervousness like this moment. I was standing there naked about to sing the sappiest love song in the entire world to the one boy who never wanted me—at least that’s what it felt like.
Where the hell did Taylor go? She was supposed to warn me.
Max and Muffin, my parents two cocker spaniels, came tearing into the room yapping and jumping up on Zach’s legs and mine. I heard his chuckle just before he saw me. After all this time, he had become a stranger whose laugh I could recognize anytime, anywhere.
“Zach… hey,” I greeted him a little too breathlessly. But I was a little too surprised—and he was a little too gorgeous.
Ripped jeans and a shirt that clung to him like it was painted on brought back memories of summertime when even Mother Nature herself got all hot and bothered admiring a topless Zach Parker. He hadn’t lost the solid build from his football days. If anything, his frame matured into smoother, wider expanses of male that I wanted to lick like he was ice cream about to melt away.
His whole body tensed at my greeting. Lean, sculpted muscles outlined by the washed denim and a plaid button-up made him look like Hercules masquerading as a farmer.
Eyes that were still the color of honey and molasses stuck to me, leaving a sticky sweet trail of goosebumps over everything that they touched. I hadn’t gone all-out when getting dressed after showering the plane off of me because I knew that would have been taken the wrong way. Instead, I settled for a comfortable, stretchy pair of jeans and a bulky, dark red sweater that laced up the back.
Perfect for keeping in all the heat he’d just ignited in me. With a frustrated and shadowed stare, no less.
It was probably a good thing for my ovaries that he didn’t want me; they might explode if he looked at me like he actually did.
“Blake,” he said with a low, gruff voice. The edge in his tone was almost as chiseled as his jawline. Greek god. Definitely. I hoped that my sweater could hide my shiver.
“How are you?” I asked with a nervous smile. “How’s your family?”
His hands shoved into his pockets as he replied, “Fine,” glancing around as though he were waiting for back-up.
Ass.
“Blake!” Taylor’s sing-song voice preceded her around the corner. “Your brother is—” she broke off as she walked into the room and saw Zach and I locked in awkward silence. “Oh, you already know,” she continued with a sheepish grin. “Hey, Zach.”
I glared at her for not being here to do the one thing I asked her to do—the one thing that was her job. Prepare me.