“Maybe you could offer to do all the shopping this week,” Victoria suggested. “Or eat out a lot.”
“My mother is gonna get a pedicure and read the article!” A horrible thought slammed into my head. “Is there an article? What does it say?”
“Okay, hold on, hold on ….. Here.” She skimmed the page, nodding to herself. “Nothing bad. Nothing that we didn’t already know. You’re the new music muse, Simon plays in the Lolitas, et cetera.” She kept reading. “It says here that Evan is currently on tour in Japan and had no comment through his spokesperson. Wow, Japan! Way to go, Ev.”
“This is all his fault.” I buried my face in my hands and rested my elbows on my knees.
“Hey … wait a minute.” She was peering more intently at the magazine now, and then she shoved it under my nose. “Is that you in English class?”
I grabbed it from her so I could see for myself.
Oh. My. God. Yet. Again.
“That is you in English class!” Victoria crowed. “And you’re sleeping!”
Sure enough, it was a grainy-and-obviously-captured-by-a-super-strong-camera-lens photo of me asleep in class, my head propped up on one hand as I dozed. (I honestly didn’t remember falling asleep in class, but really, our teacher, Mrs. Himkin, has a voice like a white-noise machine, so it makes sense.)
And there was a very suspicious person in the background, smiling right at the camera. Sharon fucking Eggleston.
“That girl,” Victoria fumed when I pointed out Sharon’s cameo in the picture. “She’s certifiable. How did she even know there were photographers taking pictures of you?”
“She spends her entire life posing,” I pointed out. “It finally paid off.”
Victoria just shook her head and continued reading the article. “’Audrey’s a great girl, but I couldn’t keep up with her,’ says nineteen-year-old bassist Simon, whose band the Lolitas is opening a string of dates for comeback kids the Plain Janes.” She shook her head. “Wow, what an asshole. You really need to start dating math nerds.”
“I need to join a convent.”
“No, I changed my mind. What you need is a spokesperson.”
I looked up just long enough to glare at her. “Not helping.”
“Seriously, Aud, you do. You need someone to spin this, to tell your side of what happened. A good publicist would’ve kept this out of the press.”
I glared at her.
“What?” she said. “I watch E! True Hollywood Story just like everyone else! These aren’t industry secrets!”
The bell rang then and I took the magazine from her and stuffed it into my bag. “The fewer people who see this, the better.”
Victoria watched, biting her lip. “Their circulation has to be, like, a million. Are you going to hide all of them?”
“Not. Helping.”
But of course there were already three copies of the magazine in my English class being passed around under the desks, and then four more in biology in the afternoon. Someone must have made a newsstand run during lunch, because while I tried to hide in the library, six different people came up to me with the magazine and ever-present Sharpie, saying, “Um, Audrey?” I signed because I didn’t know what else to do.
For the first time in my life, I had absolutely no idea what else to do.
Someone did, though. During biology, an aide came up from the office and whispered something to our teacher, who then motioned to me. “Audrey?”
I went up, my face still flaming, my legs still rubbery, with—no surprise here—everyone watching me. “You’re wanted up in the office,” the teacher said quietly. “You can take your stuff with you.”
“Oh.” Was it possible to be expelled for being in a tabloid newspaper? I wondered. Would this be on my college transcripts? “Okay.”
When I got to the office, the secretary motioned to a chair outside of the principal’s door. “Go ahead and take a seat,” she said. “He’s in a meeting right now, he’ll be out in a minute.”
“Okay.” It was becoming the easiest answer.
The chair was uncomfortable and hard, and I shifted a bunch of times before noticing that there was a copy of the magazine on the secretary’s desk, buried between piles of paperwork. She saw me looking and gave me a half-apologetic smile. “My daughter’s a fan,” she said. “She loves the song. She’s mad at me for not getting Evan’s autograph when he went to school here.”
I couldn’t even try to be polite. “Fantastic.”
And then out of the corner of my eye, I saw red hair.
James.
He was back!
He was standing in line at the front of the office, explaining something with a note in his hand, and he looked up just as I was beginning to stare. His eyes widened when he saw where I was sitting. “You? In trouble?” he mouthed.
I shrugged and waved back, trying to look both cute and innocent.
He walked over a few minutes later, once he was done at the front counter, and we both regarded each other. It was different to talk to him at school. There was no work to hide behind, no cones to scoop or sales to ring up. I didn’t know what to do with my hands or arms. Fold them in my lap? Cross them? Play with my hair? Then I realized that James was doing the same thing, too. It was Awkward City for both of us.
“Hi,” he finally said. “What’d you do?”