The Real Real (27 page)

“Sure . . . ” I say, staring at the horizon, buying a second to think. “The thing is, actually, I’m with Nico. We’re already on our way into the city to get . . . prom dresses, so today won’t work. Sorry.”

Nico mouths, “
Nice
.”

“Well, Fletch wants to do this now, so . . . ”

“Unless you wanted to meet us in the city, I don’t see how we can.” Nico gives me a thumbs-up as I tap-dance to ensure we don’t have to see him today.

“That’s not really convenient for Fletch, Jesse.”

“What the hell!” he rants in the background. “Tell her to get her ass over here,
now
. I’m sick of her shit.”

“Fletch,” Kara tries. “She’s already in the city with Nico—”

“Nico?” Fletch repeats. Nico grips her hand over mine to listen into the phone. “Fine . . . great. That’s great.

Well, they both should get in the fucking car and come back.”

“Jesse,” Kara pleads.

We hear Fletch grab the phone from her and then he’s on. “Turn. Around.”

Oh, so done. “See, there you all go talking to me in the imperative tense again.” I tug the phone from Nico.

“The imperative?” Fletch balks. “What?”

“
Turn
around.
Tilt
your head.
Get
in the golf cart—

sorry, the
fucking
golf cart. Oh, and my new favorite least favorite:
Smile
.” My anger is roiling now as Nico’s eyes bug. “It’s one of those fancy Latin things they teach you at a place like Georgetown, only I won’t be going there now because you guys
lied
to us. About what was being filmed, what was being used, that
we
were being used. So, uh, Nico and I are almost at the tunnel. I think I’m going to lose you. Fletch? Fletch? Yup—sorry, bye!”

I hang up, my heart pounding.

“Wow.” Nico gazes at me with unprecedented admiration.

“Thanks.” I bite my lip.

Fletch’s phone rings.

My phone rings.

Nico’s clutch buzzes.

“They’re just going to keep calling.” Nico drops her head to her knees. “And then they’ll show up at our houses.

A stoked network means—”

“A stoked network means they need something from us.” The realization that we actually have some leverage fully landing, I whip open my phone and answer it.

“Yes?”

“Jesse, it’s Kara. I’m
really
sorry about Georgetown.

We’ll make it up to you. But you guys need to turn around and come back out to the island. Fletch has to speak to both of you—”

“You’ll make it up to me with
what
?! A sweatshirt? A beer cozy?”

There’s the sound of fumbling and then Fletch’s voice is back on the line. “I don’t know who the hell you think you—”

“I think I’m the highest rated cable show this week.”

And if we’re going to have to face you eventually, I’m certainly not dragging Nico back to the scene of her mauling.

“So if you want to talk to us that badly, meet us in the city.

At XTV. Three o’clock.”

I disconnect and turn to Nico.

“What are you doing?” she asks incredulously as I reach out a hand to help her up.

“Other than going Katherine Heigl on their ass, I have no idea.”

“You have no idea,” she repeats, crossing her arms over the blazer, wrapping it around her against the gathering wind.

“Nope.” I wipe the sand off my jeans. “But we have a phone we shouldn’t have. So that’s a start.”

In Kinko’s parking lot I leap back into the driver’s seat and toss the twenty disks, still warm from being burned, into Nico’s lap.

“Oh my God!” she snorts. “Back up enough?”

“We’re going to leave nineteen behind and take one with us.”

“Genius. My turn.” She points at the fabric roof, which 281

has been neatly spliced down the center. Her face glowing, she opens her hands to reveal two microphones and a transmitter. “I ran down the block to the hardware store, bought a magnet and a razor. Once I found the transmitter, I sliced along the wires and found the mikes. We’re good to go.”

“I don’t know about star quality, but if we can rustle up an Asian third I say we give serious consideration to the
Charlie’s Angels
thing.” I peel us out and, after splitting the disks between each of our garages, book it to the Long Island Expressway, praying we stay ahead of Fletch.

“So, what
do
we want?” I ask Nico as I edge above the speed limit.

“Options.”

“Right,” I chorus, reaching over to switch on the radio, and a Coldplay song fills the car. The Coldplay song XTV

played over the internationally broadcasted limo hookup between me and my riding companion’s boyfriend. I push it off.

“So that’s not going away,” she mutters as she rolls up her window.

“I said at the beach—”

“Oh, I’m sorry, is this getting old for you? Because I, for one, am thrilled to get to watch my ex get ridden every time I turn on the fucking TV.”

I bite my tongue to keep from invoking Trisha and try for humor. “How many apologies are required to cover reruns?”

A chilly silence descends as we remember who we’re seated next to—the fact that we’re solely dependent on each other in this impromptu mission beginning to feel risky at best. I try to ignore the returning image of her walking away from my pleas at the 21 Club, all the more pointed now that she’s owned up to it. Try to remind myself that the images she has to overlook fill an entire twenty-two minutes of television, rerunning in perpetuity.

Before we know it, we’re crossing the Midtown Tunnel between rush hours. I maneuver us west through stop-and-go traffic, toward Times Square. After counting my money at a stoplight, I find a garage and drive in.

“Did you get some sleep?” I ask as we get out of the Lexus, scanning the tightly packed cars for the attendant.

“A little. Do we have a plan yet?” she asks in turn.

“Not unless you dreamed of one.” I flip open the trunk, pull out a pair of jeans and sweater from the mini-closet that’s sprouted there, and toss them to her. She opens the back passenger door, leaving her heels on the blacktop.

With a quick scan for the still-absent attendant, I turn my back and she slides onto the seat to slip off her G-patterned romper. “But we now have a mantra.”

“Which is?” Lying on her back she tugs up my jeans, which are like capris on her, sticks her feet back into her heels, and shrugs on Fletch’s blazer over the sweater.

“The thing my parents never had,” I answer as she tosses her wadded Gucci into the backseat and slams the 283

door. “
Options
.” We both look to where the freight elevator is descending with a uniformed man inside and weave over to drop off my keys.

Murmuring our mantra and keeping our recognizable heads down, we push across Forty-fifth Street through the crowd of tourists staring up at the pulsing billboards. With a little elbow we maneuver to the glass tower’s revolving lobby doors and pass beneath the rotating Buick-sized XTV logo and into the relative silence of the atrium. We don’t let ourselves slow for even a second, lest we lose our nerve, and beeline across the tan flecked floor for the escalator and up one flight to the guard’s desk. Pulling out our driver’s licenses, Nico announces, “Nico Sargossi and Jesse O’Rourke for Fletch Chapman, please. He’s expecting us.”

The burly guard gets on the phone to confirm us with I don’t know who and then points to a row of metal detectors. We pass through and, instead of turning toward the elevator for the studio as we have in the past, we walk to the bank for the executive floors. I step in behind Nico and, looking up at the department store–like legend over the doors, press 33 for XTV, which is sandwiched between all the other entertainment networks the parent company, Zeus Media, owns.

“This is insane.” I turn to her, my clanging nerves making my pre-
Good Morning America
wooziness feel like Buddhist clarity as the express elevator rattles in its shaft, hurtling skyward. My ears popping, we pass Animal 284

World on 31, the Fashion Network on 32, and bob to a stop, the door whisking open. “We can’t go in there without knowing what the hell we’re going to do. What the hell are we going to do?”

Nico suddenly darts her arm across me to press 40. The top floor—Zeus headquarters.

“Nico, seriously, what are we doing?” I ask as the door slides shut.

“What
I
do best,” she says with a glimmer of her signature confidence. My stomach sinks farther as I imagine her cartwheeling off the elevator.

The door glides open into a small, white-marble reception space, and we step out beneath a gilt ceiling. “May I help you?” the receptionist asks from behind the white leather desk trimmed with gold darts, her middle-aged face coiled in suspicion.

“Hi. We’re here to see Mr. Hollingstone.” Nico beams, and I focus on not passing out on the marble.

“You don’t have an appointment,” the receptionist states flatly, and I sense a finger reaching toward a security buzzer. I step back, ready to make a break for the elevator.

Ready to drive all the way back to Fletch’s rental. Ready to remember that we are two eighteen-year-olds from a town with a population that probably runs a close second to the workforce in this building.

Nico swans toward the desk. “We’re supposed to be downstairs with Fletch right now,” she says, putting a slightly conspiratorial spin on the word
Fletch
. The 285

receptionist gives her a blank stare. “Fletch Chapman from XTV?”

“Fletcher, yes, of course,” she concedes, her expression no less dubious.

“We’re on
The Real Hampton Beach
,” I find my voice to explain, the statement forever holding its uncomfortable charge. “Jesse O’Rourke?”

“Oh my gosh!” she says, a smile breaking her face open with a twinge of embarrassment. “Nico, Jesse! I’m such a fan! Apologies.”

Nico perches her perfect ass on the corner of the white leather. “We couldn’t let this opportunity pass without coming up here to thank Alistair in person for
everything
he’s done for us.”

Yes, this is what she does best.

“Thank him?” The receptionist blinks. I blink. “Of course. That’s . . . lovely of you ladies.” She presses her phone. “Mr. Hollingstone? Two stars of
The Real Hampton Beach
are out here, and they’d love to thank you.”

“Who’s with them?” a gravelly voice echoes out into the marble.

“No one, sir. They have a meeting with Mr. Chapman.”

The intercom goes dead.

“I love your sweater,” Nico coos, staring admiringly at the woman’s boxy rose twin set.

“Thank you.” She touches her pearls as the door behind her opens, and there stands the octogenarian emperor 286

of the thirty-nine-floored media conglomerate stacked beneath our feet.

“Ladies,” he says warmly as he extends his hand to Nico. “You’re unescorted?” he looks behind us to confirm his receptionist’s assessment.

“Yes, hope you don’t mind,” Nico says, boldly kissing him on the cheek as she passes into his office, eliciting her second blush on this floor. She is full-wattage now. I am not. I shake his hand and smile like a clammy idiot.

Realizing that he is not going to have us thrown out, I notice first that Mr. Hollingstone’s old-fashioned wood-paneled office has a view clear to Central Park. And second, that every square inch is crammed with best-selling books, Emmys, Oscars, and Tonys, promotional posters, signs, and cardboard stands, footballs, Frisbees, and beer cozies.

And right next to his desk, sitting atop an easel, is a large mock-up of an ad for
The Real Hampton Beach: Season
Two!
Each of our individual pics from the
OK!
photo shoot is positioned along a beach at sunset, the pool cue Photoshopped out of Drew’s hand, the horse Photoshopped out from under my ass.

“So what can I do for the current jewel in the crown of XTV?” he asks, leaning back against his desk and glancing so fast at his watch I wonder if it actually happened.

“We just wanted the chance to meet you in person!”

Nico gushes. “And thank you. Oh, look!” she says, pointing at the poster like it was a kitten wrapped in puppies sprinkled with ducklings. “That’s so exciting!”

Where
is she going with this?

“It is!” I nod up and down, up and down. “So exciting! Yes.”

“You know, Jess and I are supposed to be downstairs
right now
discussing season two. Hey! Do you want to come?” she inquires with a verve reserved for a Playmate asking if someone wants to see her naked.

Again, another flash watch-check, impressive for a man of any age. “I’d be delighted,” he says, taking her proffered hand and wrapping it around his cashmere’d bicep.

“How is old Fletch? Shaving yet?” He chuckles as we pass back out into the waiting area. “Eudora, hold my calls. I’m just going to escort these lovely young ladies to Fletch’s office. I’ll be back in ten minutes.”

“What’s your plan?” I mouth as he pushes for the elevator.

“
What’s yours?
” she mouths back. Again the flash to 21, the question of trust. Is she going to throw me under the bus, save herself? Will I do the same if it comes down to it?

We step inside with him and the car drops down, while Nico keeps up a steady stream of chatter about how much we
love
the show and how
happy
we are. The doors open onto a metallic-blue hallway that runs the length of the building, with only one door at its end. Lights along the perimeter of the floor transition from red to blue to green under the framed platinum records and pictures of Fletch with everyone from Kid Rock to Charlotte Church.

Finally, Mr. Hollingstone raps on Fletch’s door with his freckled knuckles.

“Fletch, they’re here,” Kara says, swinging it open.

“Mr. Hollingstone!” She leaps back. “What a surprise!”

She continues walking backward, and the three of us follow her into Fletch’s office—metallic wallpaper, lots of white leather, gray carpeting, zebra prints, and an actual conversation pit. It’s impossible to discern if he paid a fortune to make it look like this or inherited it directly from someone who wore slit sweatshirts the
first
time around.