Me too *heart*, I typed back immediately. Wish it was today. Wish you were here now, I could have added but didn’t.
“Must’ve gone well with Oliver,” Hadley says, hanging the Balotelli gown she picked up on the rack outside my walk-in closet.
“How can you tell?”
“Uh, you’re smiling.”
I squint over at her, testing the sensation on my lips. It does feel strange. Like my lips are, in fact, in an upright and locked position. Huh. Interesting.
“Ugh. He’s so hot too,” she continues. “Why didn’t you say that’s what hockey players look like? I totally get it now. Please tell me how he looks naked. You don’t pay me enough to withhold details like that.”
I snort a laugh and pull on a hoodie. I’ll change into my opening outfit at the venue. Might as well be comfortable until then. “Well. I. Wouldn’t. Know,” I say in a light tone. “I didn’t see him naked.”
She blinks in surprise, cocking a hand on her hip. “How? I mean… you two practically disintegrated that arena with your sparks.”
I shrug and grab the cappuccino she left for me on the vanity. “He just wanted to talk.”
“He wanted to talk? Oliver Levesque, a professional athlete, wanted to talk?”
I shrug again. “He also wants to see me again.”
She lifts a brow. “To talk some more?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. It was nice,” I say softly. Her eyes change as she studies me, warming from gossip to compassion.
“Okay. So when are you seeing him again?”
“I don’t know. When can I?”
She gives me a snarky look in exchange for my snarky question and pulls up the schedule. A chill rushes through me when her face falls. “Crap. Um…”
And there goes the smile on my face. The color around me.
“You know what? Let me see if I can move that interview with Songset Magazine. We can’t change the shoot, but if we switch the interview to phone, you can take that on the drive back which would give you two hours between the shoot and your meeting with White Flame.”
“Two hours?” My voice cracks on those dismal words.
“Well, an hour and a half,” she says dimly. “We’d need a half hour to get to the meeting.”
Air. Gosh, I hate air and its ever-present control over my existence. A minute ago there was plenty. Now? “What are the exact times I’m free?”
“One-thirty to three on Wednesday.”
I swallow a foul-tasting knot in my throat. “That’s four days from now. There’s nothing else before then? Nothing?”
She shakes her head, and her apologetic look doesn’t ease the sudden pain in my chest.
“Change the interview. I’ll check with Oliver.”
I wait on the platform, fists flexing in time to the count in my in-ear monitors. The sequined jumpsuit itches like crazy, but I ignore it in favor of reviewing the opening sequence. Riser up, stalk forward and down the LED-lined staircase, choreographed solo dance routine to an extended track-only intro of “Boy Crazy,” live band in with dancers to my right and left silhouetted behind a screen. Full four-count of a blackout and…
Magic.
Tonight’s show is sold out, like every show for the last three years. Thirty-thousand people here to see me, Genevieve Fox, do what she was literally born to do. I don’t blame them. I’m good at this. It’s not arrogance, just a fact resulting from being raised on a stage and in the glow of a spotlight since I was an infant. In many ways, I grew up with these strangers. I’m a distant relative they feel like they know, even though we’ve never met and I’m only a conception in their minds.
I test a smile on my face, widening my grin to loosen stiff facial muscles. With all the makeup, my skin feels like plaster. The platform jerks to life, and I steady against the movement, balancing expertly on high heels I’ve been wearing for years. My mini-shorts jumpsuit feels welded to my body as I position each limb and muscle into its carefully choreographed place.
“Intro-two-three-four,” a programmed voice warns in my ear.
The riser clicks into place at the top of the elaborate staircase set piece, and I stalk forward to the first cue taped on the floor. One glistening heel stomps in front of the other, my hips sashaying with trained confidence. No smile yet—this is a pouty, sexy look. I’ll be their friend later.
The crowd extends out in an expansive sphere around me, distant sparkling specks who’ve paid dearly to admire me. They’re shimmering pebbles with their flashing cameras and glowing phones while they jump and scream in excitement. My brain shuts off as my body launches into autopilot, contorting and rocking in flawless synchronization with the music its rehearsed dozens of times. I forget the crowd, the scrape of the abrasive fabric on my skin, caught up in the routine of another night, another ocean of strangers who will pretend to love me from afar–as long as I reinforce what they want to believe. Tonight, I do.
“Heavy beats on the dance floor
Can’t hear your blah-blah-blah
Over all the oh-la-la
I’ll be dancing the low beat, the high heat
Grinding that sick riff with these hips you don’t own anymore
No more thump thump of your cold heart
Just the bum bum of the kick drum
You won’t like what Imma bout to start
Best grab that drink and find the door
‘Cuz this mess is yours, baby
Hope you know
It’s your show
I’m not the girl you left, so
Can’t blame me
You’ve made me boy crazy
Cray-ay-ay-eh-eh-zee
Cray-ay-ay-eh-eh-zee”
I navigate the stage effortlessly, ducking around dancers or joining them when I need to, soaking in the lights or avoiding their glare. I know when to smile, when to look confident, when to be touched and overcome with emotion. I know how to utilize every inch of the stage to reach as many members of the audience as possible and draw them into my fantasy. Make them believe in every magical moment that has been rehearsed until it looks natural and unplanned. Yes, I sell my soul to make thirty-thousand new friends. Like last night and the night before and the night before. I become what they want because I can be anything for two hours.
And at the end of the night, when those thirty-thousand friends return to strangers, I will still be Genevieve Fox, alone, unknown, preparing to seduce thirty-thousand more.
“Great job tonight!”
“That was amazing!
“You were stunning!”
“You had something extra on ‘Horizontal.’ So good!”
I offer a smile and thanks to all the well-wishers as I suck on a water bottle and launch through the underbelly of the stadium. With security clearing the way, we keep a good pace toward the sanctuary of my dressing rooms. Tonight went great, hardly a hitch except for a two-second delay on the trigger for “Barely There.” I’m sure no one noticed except me and the crew, but there will still be a meeting on that before tomorrow’s show. That brief pause will be treated like a global crisis, requiring a task force and urgent investigation. My performance was flawless, however, and I left the stage as a goddess, revered by thousands of new followers. I should be on a high, and yet, as I crash into my dressing room, those thirty-thousand friends are already forgotten in favor of one who wasn’t even here—the one person who won’t accept my sacred status.