Emma watched the boys rehearse from the side of the stage. They were like a group of pre-schoolers hyped up on sugar, running around the space, prancing and spinning. A choreographer shouted instructions which they mostly ignored. Their vocals were good, and she shivered as Amit hit shimmering high notes, with Will’s raspy tenor supporting it.
Okay, they could really sing. She wasn’t sure why she was surprised. Oh, yeah, she remembered the band had been auto-tuned to within an inch of their lives on their albums. This would be good, and if they could keep Ed from walking into the pyrotechnics because they were on a larger stage than the one in London, then everything would be perfect.
Couldn’t they see that they needed her? This sort of talent needed to be publicised. They needed a bigger audience. She took a sneaky video to send to Gee.
‘Hey, she’s here.’ Paul’s Irish brogue cut through the boys’ voices.
She turned to see him grimacing at her. For a tour manager, he’d yet to cultivate the stoic blank look she was used to. But maybe being with this lot meant that he’d been pushed to his limit.
She followed behind him, her lanyard pass swinging from her neck. Why did they always rub? She scratched at the point where it was itching her.
She heard Frankie before she saw her.
‘How many times have I told you, Tess. It is my name in the headline and if I have to share it then I still come first. We had this written into the contract, didn’t we? So, go and get the Daily Planet to change it. Doesn’t Don Warton want an exclusive? Use the pressure on him. Okay so where is this twinky boy-bander? He’d better be more believable than when you put me together with that queer werewolf actor… you should’ve known he’d done gay porn.’
What the hell? Emma couldn’t help but feel herself go cold and she had a sick feeling in her stomach. Was this really who she was making Ed hang out with, even for a moment? Frankie seemed… well, abrasive seemed too tame a name for it.
Frankie Quick might be a phenomenon in the music industry, but in real life, she was a phenomenal pain in the arse.
For someone whose public persona was perky girl next door, approachable, and no fuss, she sure made up for it in private.
Emma stumbled over a cable as she and Paul came closer.
The group of people turned.
Crap.
‘Hi, Frankie, I’m Emma Woodhouse I work for Mega! Management.’ She put her hand out to shake Frankie’s.
There was a brief uncomfortable pause as Frankie stared at her hand like it was a bomb.
Should she take it back? It felt weird to have it just hanging there. Was it beginning to sag?
She watched it tremble as if it were someone else’s.
‘Hi, I’m Tess,’ the woman standing next to Frankie said. She reached out to take Emma’s hand, as she was pulling it back.
This was not a good way to start a business relationship, she thought as she pulled her hand back to find Tess was attached to it. Tess lurched forward into her arms.
Bugger.
‘Sorry.’ She righted Tess and went to brush her down. The woman looked at her as if she were mad. Emma froze with her hands poised above the other woman’s breasts. Not good.
Okay, so she wasn’t going to be friends with Frankie’s team. She could deal with that.
‘For god’s sake, what are we doing dealing with amateurs?’ Frankie said.
Emma could feel herself heating up with embarrassment. How dare Frankie call her an amateur, she’d been in the business longer than this brat. She drew herself up and looked over at the spoilt star who was rolling her eyes and stabbing at the screen of her phone.
Frankie’s style was polished girl next door with her sleek, long, dark blonde hair with a fringe over her slightly too small blue eyes and her lips always puckered into a smile and painted pink. Very wholesome, although Emma could’ve done without the cutesy animal knitted jumpers, it had always reminded her too much of Dolores Umbridge and she wasn’t sure it was the best look. But now, being in front of her, she realised that maybe the jumpers were exactly right. Frankie’s expression held no warmth. Cold and lizard like. Umbridge.
She shuddered. She needed to get this done as soon as she could, being around Frankie too long could freeze her.
‘Okay,’ Emma said. ‘So we’ve got some photographers in the stadium for rehearsals, all of them are known to us and we get to pick what photo gets out. We’ve also planted a few crew members with their phones plus the publicist team to make sure we get the optimum video. We’ll be releasing it through an alleged crew account that is managed by us.’ She wasn’t letting anything go by chance. They had one take on this and she had cameras scattered across the space to ensure she got full coverage.
‘Fine. Let’s get it over with, I’ve already wasted too much time on this,’ Frankie said.
Emma glanced at Tess who was fairly quivering with anxiety. She wasn’t sure how someone could simultaneously lean forward as though waiting for the off and also be cowering back as if waiting for a smack. Maybe dealing with the BOTP boys wasn’t so bad.
‘This way,’ Paul said from behind and her and she turned and hurried back. Please god, let this work, she thought. They headed back towards the stage. She gave her pre-arranged signal to Amanda.
Amanda went on stage and whispered to Ed. He stopped bopping around immediately, his whole body slumped as if the strings had been cut. Paul then beckoned Ed over. He looked over at Will before turning to walk slowly towards them.
It was as if everything stopped, a suspended instant. Will’s vocals cut, then Amit’s supporting harmonies fell away. The other three boys were frozen in place, their backing band faltering to a stop. They all watched Ed walk away from them. And then in the silence there was the snipping click of a camera shutter closing.
It was like watching a film in slow motion. Ed approached them and Emma felt Frankie move past her. She looked at Frankie’s face and between one second and the next it was like watching a mask fall over her face. Gone was the cold, basilisk stare to be replaced with her famously coy smile. It flicked on and she began to twirl her hair with the same fingers that had been stabbing at her phone.
She couldn’t help but recoil, she could feel her whole body involuntarily step back as if backing away from a predator. She saw that Ed’s steps faltered, as if he too wanted to back away. He looked over at Emma, his eyes wide with panic, his smile fixed like a grimace.
She tried to conjure up an encouraging smile. She hoped she’d succeeded although he was looking even more panicked. Why did this feel like she was throwing him to the lions?
And then suddenly, Frankie reached him and her hand came up, the pink tipped fingers grasping his arm. Ed jumped and squeaked.
There was a sudden screech of feedback.
She jumped as did everyone but Frankie, whose eyes were firmly on Ed. Emma looked over to see Will standing in the middle of the stage, his microphone rolling away from his feet and across the stage. His face was fierce, he looked as if he was about to go over and rip Ed away from them.
‘Hi,’ Frankie purred, as she glanced coquettishly up through her eyelashes at Ed.
‘Er… hello?’ he replied, he kept looking over her shoulder to Emma. She knew if he could’ve done, he would have turned tail and sprinted back to the safety of his group.
Frankie leant across, grabbed his face with her free hand and manhandled it so that she could press a forceful kiss to Ed’s cheek. When she leant back there was a lipstick mark branding his skin in pink. It was perfectly placed as if it had been drawn on.
There was a sudden flurry of camera clicks going from a variety of phones and large cameras that seemed to have appeared from nowhere. Emma glanced round the auditorium to check everyone who was supposed to be filming was. Amanda’s assistant had her phone out, she gave Emma a thumbs up. Excellent. That would be the video that would be released via the bogus crew account. There was always some random sound guy called Mike, that she could blame the account on if asked. She watched as the girl finished filming and dropped her phone back in her pocket.
As if it had been timed, as soon as the filming stopped Ed was recoiling back, wrenching his arm from Frankie’s grip. He reached a hand up and started to scrub at the mark, the look on his face a picture of betrayal.
It wasn’t her fault, it wasn’t. If she didn’t do this job then someone else would. It was the best for them, Emma thought, trying to drown out the voice in her head that seemed to speak with Gee’s voice. It was a means to an end. They would be thankful. One day.
It didn’t stop her feeling like shit though.
Frankie stood her ground and other than frowning slightly, the mask of sweet coyness looked as if it had never shifted.
‘Eddie, it is so fabulous to meet you,’ she purred. ‘I’ve heard so many great things about you. Maybe we can get together privately and do some personal research…’
If Emma had thought Ed had looked panicked before, she was now worried he was not only going to bolt, he was actually going to relocate to South America under the witness protection programme.
Crap, she could see Will had moved closer, Sean and Amit flanking him. This was a disaster waiting to happen. It would be like West Side Story… She had a brief flash of everyone bursting into song.
She needed to make sure the other boys never got close to Frankie. Especially Will. She had visions of what damage he could do. Especially when it seemed that Frankie was interested in making this more realistic.
It was ironic that all she’d wanted was for one of these fauxmances to turn real but… not this way. It felt unclean.
‘I… I…’ Ed stuttered, and started to gasp for breath.
‘The boys are busy with rehearsals, maybe another time,’ she said as she stepped forward trying to get between Frankie and Ed, but so that she wasn’t in any photos. The look that Frankie gave her chilled her to the bone. Making an enemy of Frankie was probably a bad idea. Damn.
‘Fine,’ Frankie said, almost spitting the word at her, the mask falling for a nanosecond before she put it on again as she turned back to Ed, leant across Emma and stroked his arm.
‘Another time, lover boy. We’re going to have fun.’ It was weirdly predatory from someone who looked like butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth.
‘Erm…’ Ed said as he stood hunched over, his legs and arms crossed as if he could make himself smaller and less of a surface area for Frankie to touch. Emma could feel the fine tremors that were running through his body.
‘Excuse me?’ He said it like a question, but obviously wanting for permission to get away. She wondered if she could run away with him.
‘Of course, Ed. Can’t keep the boys waiting,’ Emma said cheerily to the other woman whilst backing away as Ed turned tail. She wasn’t sure whether Frankie would chase after him. Maybe she saw Ed’s reluctance as a challenge, saw him as prey to be hunted. Emma tried to get the image of Frankie wearing camouflage and sporting a rifle out of her head. But it seemed too apt.
She turned to see that Ed had pretty much sprinted back to the band, who as soon as they saw him move, went to him. Will, of course, got to him first. He snagged him round the shoulders, and brought him in for a hug. Just before the rest of the boys piled in for a group hug Will looked at her. She wondered how he was going to make her pay.
Great, she thought. Less than twenty-four hours in Tinseltown and she already had two people gunning for her.
***
Everything was orange, Emma thought, as she stood in line at Starbucks. Pumpkins peaked from behind piles of coffee beans. The boards broadcast the pumpkin flavoured lattes. What she wanted to see was an intravenous drip, through which they delivered the caffeine straight into her veins. If they wanted to colour it orange and call it the ‘Pumpkin Pump’ to keep with the theme they could. She shut her eyes and reopened them. Nope, no ‘Pumpkin Pump’ had miraculously appeared on the specials board. They were missing a trick. Ha, trick or treat.
Her phone pinged, interrupting her thoughts from going down a rabbit hole of Halloween nonsense.
Have you wrangled the animals back into line? Gee texted.
A bit of blackmail and I promised them sweets. It worked a treat. Emma lied, but also realising she was still on a Halloween kick. She wasn’t telling Gee that the scariest monster she’d seen was Frankie Quick. What would Frankie dress up as to trick or treat?
It was too early by LA standards on a Tuesday morning, but it was afternoon in the UK. She looked at the time. 6 a.m. local time. Too early, considering the first concert was tonight and she wouldn’t get to sleep probably for the next twenty-four hours. But ever since the photos of the cheek kiss had gone viral, everyone who didn’t already know Breach Of The Peace wanted to know who the cute British singer was that had captured Frankie’s attention. And Emma had spent most of the past few days hunched over her laptop monitoring social media and adjusting plans.
It was going to get bigger after today when Frankie would be seen dancing in the VIP section of the concert.
I’m in Concorde Lounge, and hydrating before the flight came the next text.
A photo pinged up after the text, showing a bottle of champagne and the bottom half of the face of a grinning Gee.
Bit early, isn’t it?
She replied doing some quick but painful mental arithmetic, realising it was two in the afternoon in London.
Blame this one
Gee sent a photo of Lewis, grinning broadly while, flipping a two-finger salute at the camera.
Emma snorted. Of course, Lew would be heading to LA as well. He and Harry lived half their time here especially when Harry was filming.
Gee sent another selfie of the two of them with straws in the bottle, eyes crossed. She couldn’t help but smile, maybe Lew would come to the show with Gee. She could do with his calm, down to earth advice.
Though he wasn’t as good as Gee. Admittedly he was nicer to her when he delivered unasked for advice, Gee was blunt. But she wouldn’t change anything.
She sighed, she still had hours to go before Gee arrived, here in the land of orange.
Reaching the registers, she gave her order, a safe double shot no foam latte. Venti. Maybe she didn’t have to repeat it twice but she didn’t want them to get it wrong. She shuffled to the pick-up area, yawning.
She needed to work out the next best pap walk for Ed and Frankie. It had to be in the next few days before the band moved to a different city.
‘A double pumpkin spice latte and a cold brew vanilla sweet cream with a shot of pumpkin spice for Ed,’ the barista called out.
What the… she turned to look, but this wasn’t her Ed. Her heart rate settled. Not that it would be a surprise if Ed did order something pumpkin flavoured, it seemed like something he’d like.
She was staring blankly at a large gourd when her order was called. She grabbed the coffee cup with two hands and took a hit.
Bliss.
Whether it was the hit of caffeine or divine intervention, the idea of the obscene pumpkin in front of her collided with Ed and…
She had the best idea for a pap walk. It was so cute it would make anyone puke.