“I can’t lie to Luke!” I say in horror.
“Well, you can’t tell Luke,” retorts Sage.
“Becky, you’re in this now,” says Lois sternly. “And if you’re in it, you’re in it.”
That’s a quote from one of her movies, too, but I can’t remember which one. The Mafia one, maybe?
“We’ll give you your break as a stylist,” she continues. “You can dress us both for events. You’ll make contacts, it’ll be the real deal. But you cannot tell anyone.” Her eyes are flashing at me. She’s got up from her chair and looks suddenly quite intimidating, like she did when she played that partner of a law firm who was also a serial killer. “You cannot tell anyone,” she repeats.
“Right.” I swallow.
“If you do, we’ll trash you.”
I have no idea what she means by “trash,” but it can’t be good.
“Right,” I say again, nervously.
Lois has already turned away and is tapping at a laptop. “Lois and Sage to appear on Camberly,” she reads aloud. “It’s up! You should go, Becky,” she adds to me. “Call your driver. The guard will let him in and he can back the SUV right up to the door. The press won’t see you. That’s what Sage did yesterday. And if your driver asks, tell him I wasn’t available. I was too ill. That’ll get around.”
“Drivers know everything,” chimes in Sage. “Hey, look, we made Fox News!”
The two of them are totally engrossed in the laptop. There’s no point in me sticking around.
“Well … bye, then,” I say, and reach for my phone. A few minutes later Mitchell and Jeff arrive at the front door in the blacked-out SUV and I slide in seamlessly, just as Lois described. It’s like the house was designed for discreet exits. As we make our way out of the gates, journalists start banging on the sides of the SUV and flashing cameras, shouting, “Lois! Lois!” until we manage to break free and drive off.
They thought I was her. The world has gone nuts. My head is still spinning, and the blood is pulsing in my ears. What just happened there? What?
From: Kovitz, Danny
To: Kovitz, Danny
Subject: i’m so collld
So coooooooooollllld. can’ttt tyyype fingers agonynnn this issssn’t howexxpcteted
dddanananyyyy
By the time Luke gets home that evening, I’m feeling calmer. The thing is, this is what Hollywood is like and you just have to get used to it. Yes, it seems completely freaky and messed up at first, but gradually it starts to feel more normal. They’re right. It is all a game. Everyone’s playing it—the stars, the journalists, the public, everyone. And if you don’t want to play, maybe you shouldn’t come to Hollywood.
On the plus side, Sage has been texting me all afternoon, and I’ve been texting back, and it’s like we’re best friends. I’m totally in the gang! Lois even texted me, too, a few times. The forthcoming Camberly interview is already huge news, exactly as they said it would be. It’s been featured on every news website, and it’s all over the TV, too, and the Sage-and-Lois soap opera is topic A again.
They’ve been really clever. (At least, Lois has been really clever.) And now I’m part of it too! The best bit was this afternoon, when I was picking up the children from school. I’d already made quite an impression, what with Jeff and Mitchell and the blacked-out SUV. But then, when I was waiting at the preschool door to get Minnie, Sage rang and I said, “Oh hi, Sage, how are you?” just a bit more loudly than usual, and everyone turned to stare.
The only not-so-A-list thing is, all the photographers have disappeared from our gates, which is a bit disloyal of them. Well, not all. There’s one geeky Asian guy who is still hanging around. He has bleached-blond hair, and today he was wearing a pink bomber jacket with tight black jeans and rubber ankle boots. I started to pose and he took a few snaps, then he beckoned me over and said excitedly, “You’re a friend of Danny Kovitz, right? The designer? Could you get me his autograph?” It turns out his name is Lon and he’s a fashiondesign student and he worships Danny. And now he worships me, too, because I’m a friend of Danny.
And, OK, maybe I did play up to it a bit. Maybe I did promise to come out tomorrow morning wearing a vintage Danny Kovitz outfit (i.e., two years old), which never even hit the catwalks, and let him take a picture of it. The thing is, I like having photographers outside the house. It’s boring not to have any around.
I’m in the kitchen preparing an A-lister-type supper when Luke comes in. Dad must have come back at some point and he and Tarquin have gone out sightseeing—they left a note—and Suze is nowhere to be seen, so I guess she’s with them too. All the children are in bed and I’ve sent Jeff and Mitchell out for supper, so it’s just Luke and me, which is nice.
Now that I’m a rising Hollywood celebrity, I have to cook appropriately. We’ll probably need to get a chef or private juice-maker or something, but for now I’m making a very of-the-moment dish. Grain soup. It’s the latest thing. All the A-listers have it, plus I need to look thin for all my forthcoming appearances, and apparently it’s got some magic combination that boosts the metabolism.
“Hi!” I greet Luke with a kiss and a wheatgrass smoothie, which is also very healthy and A-list.
“What’s that?” He sniffs it and recoils. “I’m having a glass of wine. Want one?”
“No, thanks,” I say self-righteously. “I’m trying to follow a clean diet.” I ladle grain soup into two bowls and put them on the table. “This is totally organic and macrobiotic. It has chia,” I add.