Starstruck (11 page)

‘He
sprang it on me the day before I left for tour,’ I admit. ‘He made me promise
not to tell anyone until I’d spoken to his new publicist guy.’

‘Well
his new publicist guy has been trying to call you – nonstop,’ Emily informs me,
handing me a scrap of paper with “Charles Pace” written on, followed by his
number.

‘Is
that all? I can call him, explain I was away. It’ll be ok, Em.’

‘That’s
actually not all,’ Vicky says, raising her hand.

‘Put
your hand down,’ I snap before turning to Emily. ‘What’s happened?’

Emily
places a hand on my shoulder. ‘You’ve been mentioned on Scott Hale’s website.’

I
laugh.

‘I
have? I’m a nobody, why would he bother?’

Scott
Hale is one of those celebrity bloggers. Basically he’s a loser with a computer
and a few friends in decent places. Half of the things he posts on his website
are completely fictional, but everything he posts is completely horrible. There
are never any happy stories, it’s all “this person is on drugs, this person had
a threesome, this person had an affair with their dog”.

Vicky
happily loads up the website for me, clearly basking in my misery. I lean over
her and read the blog in question.

‘What?
That didn’t happen!’ I exclaim.

Scott
and I have never interacted in any way, shape or form, but this blog is clearly
a personal attack on me.

His
blog, which went online yesterday, explains how I went on tour with TFTR. It
then goes on to explain how, by the end of the first night, I had slept with no
less than three members of the band. Oddly, my first reaction is to consider
which three members he is referring to. My second is to work out which three
members I would pick, in order.

I
am snapped from my inappropriately timed thoughts by Vicky, who reads key parts
of the blog, titled “Nicole Wilde has Three On The Road”, out loud.

‘Claiming
to be there for journalistic purposes, Nicole Wilde of Starstruck Magazine is
currently on tour with Two For The Road. One of my spies at their Manchester
gig claimed they saw Nicole getting up close and personal with THREE different
members of the band.’ She stops reading, and starts summarising. ‘It says you
had one in the toilets, one around the back of a night club and one on the tour
bus. Is it true?’

‘Of
course it isn’t true, Vicky!’ I snap. She reads the last line to me to well and
truly twist the knife.

‘Why
pretend you’re there to work, Nicole? It’s clear enough to us that you were only
there for one reason only.... or would that be three reasons?’

I
stare at the screen for a moment. TFTR
are
getting quite famous, but
this just feels so personal. I mean, my name is in the headline! And while
there are bursts of almost truth in there, it can only be a coincidence
because, despite a couple of awkward kisses, I didn’t “have” any of them
anywhere.

‘I
have to get him to take this down!’ I insist. ‘Is there a contact address on
there?’

Vicky
gives me the email address so I take a seat at Emily’s computer and start
typing.

‘Dear
Scott,’ I say what I am typing out loud for everyone to hear. ‘I’m not sure who
gave you the information about my time on tour with Two For The Road, but I can
assure you that none of it is true. I would appreciate it if you removed the
post from your site immediately. Thanks, Nicole Wilde.’ I hit send.

‘Why
did you say you were home early?’ Emily asks, and I tell her the story of Eddie
breaking his leg. I fail to mention everything that happened, I’ll save that
for later. I am almost finished telling her my story when the computer makes a
noise.

‘It’s
a reply from Scott,’ I tell the room as I click open. ‘Oh, you vicious little
fucker!’

‘What
has he said?’ Jake asks.

I
read out loud. ‘Dear Nicole, I have it on very good authority that events
happened exactly as reported on my website –‘

‘Blog,’
Jake interrupts.

I
continue to read. ‘My spies don’t lie, Miss Wilde. The blog stays up. Scott.’

‘What
the hell?’ Emily shouts in disgust.

‘He
really is a vicious little fucker,’ Vicky tells me, and it totally throws me to
have her on my side. ‘Send him another email telling him what a vicious little
fucker he really is.’

Succubus
is right for once. I can’t just sit back and let him publish lies about me.

‘She
should do it, shouldn’t she, Emily?’ Vicky asks her, and Emily nods.

‘I
don’t think he’s gonna take it down, Nic.’

‘Exactly!’
Vicky continues. ‘He probably thinks you’re a pushover. Show him that you’re
not, and then he might take it down.’

I
regret doing it the second I hit the send button, but I do as my girls suggest
and sent Scott Hale a shitty email. I don’t feel better for sending it, and he
doesn’t reply in the time it takes me to finish my coffee and have Emily fill
me in on what’s been going on in the office.

Heading
into my own office, I shut the door behind me. I’m determined not to cry, but I
don’t want Vicky to see me just in case I do. I’m feeling a little delicate
after the past couple of days and the last thing I need is another person
making me out to be a huge whore.

My
parents moved to France not long after I started working here. I don’t get to
see them very often and I know my mum keeps an eye on my work – she is forever
Googling my name to see what comes up - and I will be absolutely mortified if
she reads Scott’s blog about me.

Fidgeting
around in my desk draw, I find my spare charger and juice up my trusty yet
battered mobile.

It
starts bleeping like crazy with missed calls, text messages, emails, tweets and
Facebook notifications – aren’t I the popular one? That reminds me, I need to
call Dylan’s new publicist guy. What was his name again? I glance at the scrap
on paper on my desk. Charles Pace. It’s a mobile number, so at least I won’t
have to go through any grumpy receptionists.

‘Charles
Pace,’ a rather serious sounding man’s voice says after several rings.

‘Hello
Charles, it’s Nicole Wilde. You’ve been trying to get in touch?’

‘Hello
Miss Wilde,’ he relaxes slightly. ‘Yes, I’m Charles. Dylan King has hired me to
take care of his extra press.’

‘Extra
press? Is that what we’re calling her?’ I laugh. He ignores my joke.

‘While
I’m sure Dylan has plenty of faith in my ability, he doesn’t entirely trust me
yet. He gave me your number because he’d like you to give me your opinion on my
ideas. He has instructed me to do whatever I see fit, providing it’s approved
by you. A rather unusual request, but he’s paying my wages.’ It’s his turned to
crack a joke, and I laugh politely because that’s what you do.

‘Unfortunately
I couldn’t get in touch with you before we ran the article in the Daily Scoop,
but we had to go ahead because Miss Slater wanted to announce the engagement as
soon as possible. Magazine deals to sort out and so on.’

‘Sorry,
you’ve lost me. Miss Slater?’

‘Crystal
Slater,’ Charles replies. ‘Dylan’s fiancée.’

‘He’s
marrying her?’ I squeal, totally horrified. The idea of Dylan getting married
is shocking enough, but to a girl he accidently knocked up! A girl he has only
known for a few days! I’m just so shocked! And what sort of chavy name is
Crystal?

‘I’m
sorry, Miss Wilde. I assumed you knew.’

Well,
that explains all the missed calls for Dylan.

‘When
are they getting married?’ I ask.

‘Next
week.’

I
say nothing.

‘I
think he’s trying to do the right thing,’ Charles offers up, it sounds kind of
like he’s trying to make me feel better. ‘Good on him I suppose.’

‘He’s
crazy! I think he’s making a huge mistake!’ I insist. Charles doesn’t say
anything in response to this, but I suppose he’s working for Dylan so it’s not
his place.

‘Did
you say magazine deal?’ I ask.

‘Yes,
for Bacci Magazine.’

I
cannot believe I’m hearing this. Maybe it was me, not Eddie, who jumped in the
pool. Maybe I bumped my head and this is all a crazy dream? First my press
debut on Scott Hale’s blog, now this. Dylan is forever harping on about “the
bloody media” and how he’d never sell his soul. He has also spent the last few
years sleeping his way through his female fanbase and I could get you a stack
of magazines featuring interviews where he says he’d never get married.

‘So,
what's the plan?’ I ask Charles.

‘I’d
give him a call, Miss Wilde. Talk things over. I’ll keep in contact over the
next few days.’

‘Ok,
but please call me Nicole.’

‘Nicole,’
he corrects himself. ‘Have a good day.’

And
with that, our call is over. One short phone call full of so much life changing
information.

My
phone only moves far enough away from my head for me to hit call on Dylan’s
name. He answers after one ring, not giving me any time to plan what the hell
I’m going to say to him.

‘Hey
Nic,’ he says sheepishly. He sounds like a little boy who knows he’s done
something wrong and that he’s going to be in big trouble for it.

‘Hay
is for horses,’ I reply. ‘I hear congratulations are in order.’

‘I
tried to tell you. I wanted to tell you first. I know what I’m doing, babe.’

‘You
only found out she was pregnant a couple of days ago, have you really thought
this through?’

‘First
of all,
she
is called Crystal. All I know is, there’s this poor girl and
she’s heavily pregnant and scared to death. It’s all my fault and I want to
make sure she’s ok. And that my kids are ok.’ He adds that last bit as an
afterthought. It’s so weird hearing him say things like that.

‘And
you have to get married to do that?’ I ask.

‘Trust
me, will you? I’ve dicked around for too long, time to do the mature thing. I’m
going to have a family, Nic!’

He
sounds almost excited. Even if I think he’s making a huge mistake, what can I say?
I’m his friend and I’ve got to support him.

‘Then
I’m right behind you. The wedding is next week?’

‘Yep.
Well, they’re highly likely to be little bastards with me being their dad, so
we don’t want to do anything else to encourage it,’ he jokes. It’s
so
weird hearing him talk about his kids and say “we” when he’s talking about
what’s-her-name. I remember a particular interview he gave a while back. He
said he’d considered having a vasectomy so that this kind of thing could never
happen. The press will almost certainly drag this quote up at some point in the
very near future. If he wasn’t my friend, I know I would.

An
awkward silence falls.

‘You’ve
got a magazine deal,’ I say to fill the silence.

‘Crystal
wants to do it, and I want to make her happy.’

‘Well
if it’s good enough for the premiership footballers and their wives,’ I tease.
I’ll bet Crystal is just like a footie WAG. I can just picture it, the big
tacky wedding with the magazine deal, photographers everywhere taking pictures
of every second of their special day. Actually, now that I’m over the shock
this isn’t sounding so bad. Maybe I can get my mug in a magazine? That’s a step
up from a trashy blog, right?

‘Charlie
seems ok, doesn’t he?’

‘Charlie?’
I reply. ‘Oh, Charles. Yeah, I think so. I was kind of in shock when I spoke to
him.’

‘Don’t
worry, ok? And expect your invitation to my stag do soon, because you’re gonna
be there. It’ll be the night before the wedding.’

‘How
traditional of you,’ I tease. ‘And I’ll bet you need me there to make sure you
don’t do anything stupid or end up naked and chained to something.’

‘Exactly!
And it wouldn’t be right without you there, would it? You’re my best friend!’

‘Aww,
you’re getting all slushy! What has this girl done to you?’ I laugh.

He
laughs too, although it’s a much more nervous sounding laugh than mine.

I
know it sounds weird, but I’m sort of excited now. I love a good wedding, I
might get my face in a magazine and I get to go shopping for a new outfit. Oh,
and the stag do! I love to party with the boys! I’ve had some wild nights with
The Burnouts and if this is Dylan’s last night of freedom I’ll bet Mikey is
planning something awesome.

Caught
up in the excitement, I totally forgot that I was on my way home for a wash and
a sleep before all this kicked off. A huge involuntary yawn reminds me of this
so I grab my bag and head towards the door.

‘By
the way, I have something to tell you, Nic,’ Emily informs me with a grin.

‘Can
it wait until this evening, love? I’m so tired I think I’m going to fall asleep
right here.’

‘Oh,
ok,’ Emily says. An unimpressed look spreads across her face.