When Cassidy broke off with not so much as a warning, we were all left holding the bag. We had a new album out, were lined up to tour Asia for the first time, and the public was at peak frenzy at that point, frothing at the mouth, climbing fences, clamoring with posters and CD liners and Sharpies held out for their available skin. We had to request the topmost floors of every hotel and reserve the entire floor underneath it with security, just so that we weren’t inundated with overzealous fans. The howling of our names was rarely frightening; if I didn’t hear the din of people shouting our names from a mob outside, twenty floors below, I would turn off the air conditioner, slide back the curtain a slice, just so I could see out but they couldn’t see me, and wait. Their voices were like lullabies.

How could we tour without her? We hatched some ideas: have a body double dance her parts, rework the lighting and fog machines so that her face was perpetually in shadow. Leave the camera off the double as much as possible, except when her back was turned. Feign illness. Feign a broken leg. Feign a death in her family. Fake her own death. (That last one was my dry suggestion.) We even had the costume designer change our outfits so that we wore visors, elaborate eye makeup, silver face paint as cheek contour. Made us look like aliens, unrecognizable. We would have probably gotten away with it for a little while and not lost all of the revenue, but we had to admit that we were playing with fire. Our fans were sharp-eyed, the front rows vicious in their adulation. If they knew that Cassidy had been replaced, there would be hell to pay. All trust lost. I just thought that Cassidy was only a little upset and would rejoin the fold. We started with a lie for the Pacific leg of the world tour.

“One of our members has been admitted to the hospital for exhaustion, vocal exhaustion, and dehydration. Her doctors noticed distressed nodes and recommend an extended rest for her voice. We are excited to visit Asia but regret that it will not be under the best circumstances.” It hurt to make that announcement. We said we’d be a trio and hedged around the promise to tour Australia with our full member list.

But all of that did nothing when Cassidy was spotted nowhere near Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in the days before we were to depart for Japan. She was in her old hometown outside of a Whole Foods instead, looking awful, no makeup, and hardly recognizable, but obviously not recuperating at home in Los Angeles. Rumors swirled; we denied.

Merry was photographed tripping over her heels and scraping her knee up on the sidewalk outside of a club. Tabloids gushed that there was trouble between us: a feud, a breakup. We denied.

Yumi went on several high-profile dates with the person who became her husband, just to deflect some of the negative attention (everyone loves a love story). He was a player for the L.A. Clippers, a match made in management heaven. Of course, once the tabloids tasted a tiny hint of blood in the water, they guessed our agenda there too. We denied.

Me, I was photographed shopping at Kitson like nothing was happening. I wanted it to be as normal as possible. A story was drafted that Cassidy’s Houston appearance was a family visit during her downtime—a stress-reduction move, nothing more. We denied, we denied, we denied.

As the days slipped by, the countdown to the tour start neared, and we were nowhere closer to having Cassidy back. Merry tried to talk to her; the label execs made some ominous comments. The three of us couldn’t get in touch. I remember calling and calling, but her voice mail was full and an automated voice informed me in clipped tones that I would have to try again later. Merry reached out to Emily, recently terminated from Cassidy’s employment, who still had a spare key. Emily and Merry let themselves into Cassidy’s house to find the furniture still there, but the fridge and pantry were completely empty and there was no human presence in the house.

Merry eventually got a hold of Cassidy, and though she refused to meet with the group, someone convinced her to talk to our PR rep, Justine, and the label. In the same office conference room where we’d met her for the first time, she dropped the bomb: There was no way she could honor her commitments. She was done. Finished. Out.

She surely received a talking-to. She was probably threatened with legalese and contract-waving and a firm finger-pointing at her finances. From what I heard from Marsha’s assistant, Nancy, she just sat there. Not defiant, not exhausted, not really anything. “She just looked sad,” Nancy had said. “She wasn’t scared of them, but something else seemed to have spooked her. She said she was sorry, but she couldn’t do it anymore.” Nancy had thrown her hands up. “I have no idea what happened. I couldn’t get a read on her. She left and that was that.”

It was going to get out anyway, Marsha said. Pull off the Band-Aid. Get it over with.

We called a press conference and gathered with our manager, Peter, and Justine. We stated that while saddened by Cassidy’s decision to leave the group, it was professionally done and for medical reasons. We assured fans that we were still planning to honor our commitments—but as a permanent trio. Then we left the stage. Justine stayed on a few extra minutes to field more questions. I saw a video clip on my homepage that evening. “Gloss had to replace a member of their group once before, and they don’t intend to do it again,” she said to one query. “The girls are very excited to begin their tour after this minor setback.”

The shit hit the fan. No matter that we were still going on tour. The fans and media despaired that it was the end of Gloss forever. True, the group would not be the same without Cassidy, but it’s not like the rest of us weren’t there to pick up the pieces. We had been a group before Cassidy, and we could survive without her.

I FLICKED THROUGH Instagram while waiting for Emily to find the dresses. Someone reposted something about Lucy Bowen in my feed; Lucy was yet another woman coming forward about her mistreatment by the great Sterling Royce, who had preyed on her when she was underage. The video auto-played. “I was seventeen and thought I was in love. He was older and should have known better.” Lucy hadn’t had a hit in years; this was probably the only way for her to make her star shine again, even if Sterling was getting his due comeuppance. I kept scrolling.

Cassidy’s once-private account was now open, and I followed a trail of tags to glean any information about her life since the fall of Gloss. She’d posted her dog, a different house, a glass of wine. But nothing that told me anything personal.

Emily’s voice: “Rose? You still there? There is a gorgeous Dolce dress that would fit you, I think. If your measurements haven’t changed too much. Though it might be a touch long.”

“I’ll swing by and pick it up tomorrow. And Emily?”

“Yeah?”

Emily had known, probably; she was too well connected not to know. But she always kept secrets. Emily was an iron vault.

I cleared my throat. “I know why you want me to talk to the others. But . . .”

“Oh,” she said. “It’s okay. I shouldn’t have pushed you. You can tell them when you’re ready.”

I knew Cassidy had been upset, but it was unacceptable that she’d left without a word of warning.

And now she’d left this world with the loudest goodbye.

Part II

Prime (2002)

19.

January 2002

Houston to L.A.

Cassidy

Christmas of 2001 felt like a funeral.

Everything I liked about the holiday had lost its luster. I baked cookies, as I usually did, though I couldn’t eat them. (I snuck one and couldn’t enjoy it; I just worried about its calorie content.) My time was divided between my family’s Christmas breakfast and the Hernandez’s holiday dinner. Although Alex’s parents opened their home to me like I was a member of their family—they’d even hung a stocking for me on their mantel—I was somehow miserable. We’d been so busy recording the second album that I had to get a personal shopper to pick out gifts, and my family squealed over their perfect presents that I’d had no hand in picking out. And even the flight had been a trial: I’d had to travel with three members of Peter’s security until I reached my airplane gate, because I had the poor sense to fly commercial.

During Christmas dinner with Alex’s family, off-kilter and sullen, I shifted turkey around my plate until it looked like I’d made enough of an effort. Then I found an excuse to sit on the back porch, brooding quietly to myself.

Alex found me trying to pet one of his neighbor’s dogs that had jumped the fence. “Are you okay?” he asked.

I avoided his gaze and continued to hold my fingers out to the dog, which wasn’t budging. “This dog is like a cat,” I muttered.

He slid closer to me and put an arm around my shoulder. I wanted to lean into him, but I was tired. It was both frustrating and a relief that my boyfriend could be so understanding—and that put me into an even worse mood, because were relationships supposed to be so middle-of-the-road? It was fine that there weren’t extreme highs or lows, but did this relationship always have to be so boring? Even the sex was humdrum.

When I saw Joanna after a long hiatus of being apart, she asked how things were with Alex. All I could do was shrug.