My Rock #6 (5 page)

I went down two floors to the room I was supposed to
meet the stylist in. In the past, the cheap bastards gave the contestants four
hundred dollars for each performance to buy their outfit. I say cheap bastards,
but honestly, I got some nice stuff with it. The problem as usual was the
girls. They whined so much about that, the producers had changed the rules.
They made it worse instead of better. They changed it so that they take our
measurements and the stylists bring clothes in and then help us choose what
we’re going to wear. I didn’t need help, but what the fuck ever. I wasn’t going
to whine about it like the girls. Brooke had gone on about it at dinner for an
hour the other night.

“Hi, Tristan!” Holly, the lead stylist opened the
door for me. There were three others in the room. The hairstylist was a flaming
gay guy who was funny as shit. I liked him, but I didn’t care much for the
uptight make-up artist and her assistant.

“Hey, Holly.”

“I’ve got some great stuff you’re going to love!”
she told me. I liked Holly, but she and I didn’t see eye to eye when it came to
fashion. She wanted to dress me up in skinny jeans and shit…not going to happen
unless she killed me first.

She led me over to two racks of men’s clothes. I
went straight for the “normal” jeans and picked out a plain pair of dark blue
Levi’s.

“Really, Tristan? All that stuff and you want the
plain ones?”

I shrugged, “You brought them, so obviously you
expected someone to wear them, right?”

She made a face at me and said, “I knew you would
bitch if I didn’t and threaten to wear your old, faded ones.”

I grinned, “How well you know me, Holly.” She rolled
her eyes as I picked out a plain blue t-shirt and a pair of black boots. I took
them into the next room and tried it all on. I needed to go one size bigger in
the shirt. I had been eating a lot better since I quit using and it was
showing. I was going to have to start hitting the gym hard before it started
showing around my middle, like a pot-bellied old man.

I went back out, took the bigger shirt, and said,
“Okay, you and I are done, Holly. Thanks.” She rolled her eyes again. I was an
affront to her profession. I turned to the hairstylist and said, “Jose, you
gonna
trim me up today?”

“Yes, my love,” I didn’t care for the pet name, but
he called everyone that, so I put up with it. He didn’t mean anything by it.
I’d seen his boyfriend and I was sure that I wasn’t even close to his type. “Come,
sit.” Jose trimmed my hair and gave me a shave. While he worked, he talked and
I thought about Elly again. I wondered if she was still mad. I was still mad at
her, but I was horny. I went back to my room and thought about her some more
after my haircut. I ended up having to take a shower. Fuck, I was horny!

That night I hung out with Ethan. He was a pretty
good guy and fun to hang out with. We gambled for a while, but I didn’t win
shit. I got a glimpse of Elly on our way in for dinner. She was on her way out.
I pretended like I didn’t see her, but damn she looked good enough to eat. After
dinner I went to the bar with Ethan and I actually went so far as to order a beer.
I thought just one wouldn’t hurt. I sat there looking at it for a while but, I
realized that even with it right in front of me, I knew I wasn’t going to drink
it. “Just one won’t hurt” was what I’d told myself every time I started back up
in the past. I pushed it back and asked the bartender for a coke instead.

The next day, I got up with a few knots in my
stomach. I know they said some nights on the show we were in front of three
hundred million people, but I didn’t have to look at them all; I forgot the
ones behind the TV were there. I would be performing in front of over sixteen
thousand people live. I’d done bigger arenas when I was a kid, but that had
been a long ass time ago. Once I’d gotten used to it back then, the bigger the
better. I loved that adoration shit the audience laid on me. Right then, I
wasn’t positive I could do it. I went to the gift shop and bought some Rolaids
and started eating them. I didn’t eat anything else; I was afraid I’d get up on
stage and puke. The show started at five and I performed last, so around seven.
I didn’t have any duets or group songs planned for that night; they wanted to
showcase us each individually the first night, they said. I went to meet with
the band at noon to go over the music for my song one last time, and by that time,
I was seriously wondering if I’d make it to seven. The anxiety was getting a
lot worse before I went in, but singing and playing the music really seemed to
help alleviate a lot of it.

We practiced for about three hours and by that time,
I thought I might be able to hold something down. I went to the restaurant and
got a turkey sandwich and took it back to my room. I ate lunch and thought
about taking a nap. It was almost four, though, and I didn’t want to oversleep.
I was about to get in the shower when there was a knock on the door. I let
myself imagine just for a second that it was Elly, here for a quickie. I pulled
it open and there stood Jake’s little messenger…again. He didn’t look anything
like Elly. Shit! I forgot I was supposed to meet with that son of a bitch.

“Hey, Tristan, Jake is waiting to see you.” He had
this tone that said he couldn’t believe I’d actually defied the great and
powerful Oz.

“Alright, I have to take a quick shower. I’ll be
down in half an hour.”

The messenger didn’t look happy with that answer,
but that was too damned bad. I was the star of this fucking show, not the
producer. If he wanted to see me, he could wait.

I took my time in the shower and then getting
dressed. I finally made it down to his room at four-thirty. When he let me in,
he raised his eyebrows and said, “You’re pushing it to the last minute,
Tristan. Don’t you still have to get dressed?”

I looked at the fucker in his custom-made three
thousand dollar suit. His hair was perfect and each one of his teeth was
covered with a shiny white veneer. It probably took him hours to get ready to
go anywhere. He may as well wear a sign around his neck that says,
‘I’m a rich mother-fucker and I think I’m
better than all of you.’

“I’m dressed,” I told him. He looked me up and down,
obviously disapproving of my choice of outfits. Fuck him, I didn’t care. “I do
have to hit hair and make-up though, so….” If we could get the fuck on with it!

“Have a seat, Tristan.”

I sat down and he said, “Would you like anything to
drink?”

“No thanks, I’m fine.”

“Okay then,” he said, sitting down opposite of me.
“First, I was wondering how the rehab was going?”

“Good. I finished the program and I only had one
therapy appointment to go outpatient when we left. He was supposed to be in
touch with the show’s therapist about it. I’ve been sober now for over 100
days.”

“That’s great, good work. It’s hard stuff; I’ve had
my own struggles with it, so I know.”

I just nodded at him. I was hoping that was it. Then
he said, “How’s the bus? Is that comfortable for you?”

“Yeah, it’s nice.” I said. Shit, I didn’t have time
for this idle chit chat crap.

“Good…good. So, how far along are you with the
songs?”

“I’m sorry? The what?”

“The songs…for the record company.”

I had no fucking clue what he was talking about.
“Um…I don’t know what you mean.”

He looked shocked, or annoyed, or something.
“Tristan, you have to have twelve songs ready to go…and already approved by the
record company by the time this tour is over.”

“What the fuck?”

“Did you read the contract you signed when you
started on the show?”

“Yeah, of course I read it,” I lied.

“Then you knew that if you won, in order to get the
money, you had to have the twelve songs done and approved by the end of the
tour.”

I could feel myself getting pissed, but I was really
trying to control it. He was not only talking to me as if I was a fucking
idiot, he was telling me that I wasn’t going to get the money I already felt
like I had worked for.

“That’s bullshit,” I said, but in an even tone. “I
won this contest…fair and square. Now we’re on tour and I’m putting on ten
shows in the next two weeks and I’m supposed to be writing original songs on
top of that?”

“It was in the contract.”

I imagined my fist connecting with his obviously
altered nose and lips before I stood up and said, “Fucking bullshit! That’s
what this is.”

He continued to sit there all composed and
professional as he said, “Bullshit or not, Tristan, it’s what’s in the
contract. Maybe this will be a lesson to you to read what you sign from now on.”

“I read it!” I snapped back. I didn’t read it, or I
did and I was too fucking high to process it. Either way, it was bullshit. Even
if I had known about it, they just didn’t give me enough time. Shit! I had nine
months. Fuck! I didn’t know who I was more pissed at, him or me.

He was looking at me with that fucking
holier-than-though look…like maybe he was an artist, like he’d ever given up a
piece of his soul to write and then sing a song in front of millions of people
and I realized, it was still him.
 
I
couldn’t stay in the room any longer without ruining his veneers and his lip
implants or injections or whatever the vain son of a bitch had put in them. I
stormed out of the room and slammed the fucking door behind me.

I had to go straight to hair and make-up. Poor Jose
got the brunt of my attitude after that while he was doing my hair. I never
spoke to the make-up chick, anyways; she was an uptight bitch. By the time they
all finished with me it was my turn on stage. I ran out under the lights and looked
out at the sixteen thousand people who had come to see me. I thought about the
millions more who had liked me enough to vote for me so I could make it there.

They tossed me my guitar and I slipped it over my
shoulders. Before I started playing, or even opened my mouth, there were people
on their feet in the audience, screaming out my name. The butterflies in my
stomach were gone along with the rest of the anxiety. I was still shaking, but
the shakes never really go away. I think that’s adrenaline and that shit feels
good; it’s the most basic form of high that you can get. When I started
singing, they screamed louder. My pulse was racing, I was sweating and I had to
consciously think about controlling my breathing so I didn’t waste it before I
was finished with my song. When I was done, I was bathed in sweat and the
lights felt like they were setting my skin on fire. I had that black shit the
make-up girl put on my eye lashes in my eyes and face powder dripping down onto
my new t-shirt. Over half of the audience was on its feet and hot girls were
throwing panties and bras and fucking phone numbers up on stage.
 
It was incredible, better than any drug. I
loved feeling like I was more than just a has-been child star. I loved knowing
that in spite of how crappy my family was, these people loved me. I wondered if
Elly was watching.

CHAPTER
SIX

ELLY

I watched Tristan’s performance with butterflies in
my stomach. No matter how pissed off I was at him, I couldn’t deny the fact
that he was incredibly hot and so talented I could hardly believe it sometimes.
If he holds it together and did what the managers and producers told him, he’d
not only be a star, he’d be a mega-star. His music would be classic someday, I
was sure of it. When he was in his element, he was the sexiest man alive. I
wanted him right then so badly that my panties were actually wet just watching
him. From the looks of the audience, and the undergarments strewn across the
stage, I wasn’t the only one. Tristan was eating it all up, but I thought
watching him play to his fans only made him that much hotter.

“Hey, Elly,” I turned to see Mike, one of Jake’s
assistants.

“Hi, Mike.”

“He’s doing an awesome job, huh?” he said, his eyes
following mine towards Tristan rocking out on the stage.

“Yeah, he really is,” I agreed.

“Jake would like to see you after the show is over.”

“Oh really? Shouldn’t I help pack things up first?
Don’t we have to take off tonight?”

“Yeah, we’re taking off tonight. Jake said to tell
you not to worry about the packing up. There are enough of us to pick up any
slack. He said it couldn’t wait.”

“Oh, okay…sure.” Damn it! What does Jake want at
nine o’clock at night? What could it be that can’t wait? I might have been
paranoid, but in my defense, I’d already been fired once.

I looked back out on the stage. Tristan was finished
with his song and was blowing kisses to the girls who were having coronaries. Some
of them held up signs with their number on it and some of them had signs that
said,
‘Marry me!’
I had to smile. He
knew how to work an audience. Unfortunately, he knew how to work me too.

 
 
While he was wrapping it up on stage, I left
to go to Jake’s room. He answered the door dressed in a light gray suit with a
charcoal tie. The shirt underneath the suit jacket was one shade lighter than
the suit and the tie one shade darker. It had big, white, French cuffs and he
wore monogrammed silver cuff links. I wondered if he had his own stylist or if
he was just that good at dressing himself. He looked like he was ready for the
stage himself.