“If you make it quick,” I added, for the sake of the unhappy travelers around me.
Lauren gasped with delight and quickly hunched down beside my seat. “Say Kitty Katz,” she cried, holding her phone high above both our heads.
“Kitty Katz.” I smiled up at her phone. She’d decorated the case with stickers of a Korean boy band. These girls really were adorable.
CLICK.
“All right, girls,” the flight attendant said, clapping his hands. “That’s enough. It’s time to go back to—”
But the girls weren’t ready to go anywhere.
“Are you doing a panel with Will Price?” Jasmine asked.
I almost choked on the refreshing mouthful of screwdriver I’d just taken. “I’m sorry, what?”
“Will Price,” Jasmine said. “You know, Will Price, who wrote When the Heart Dies? He’s going to be at the festival, too.”
“Um, no.” I shook my head with enough force to cause the end of my ponytail to swat Dark Knight in the shoulder. “Sorry,” I said to him, because of my hair.
“No problem.” Dark Knight was still smiling, watching my exchange with the girls like it was a lot more entertaining than his movie.
To the girls, I said, “No. I mean, no, I’m not doing a panel with Will Price because Will writes adult novels and I write children’s novels. And also, Will isn’t coming to the festival.”
Jasmine blinked at me with her perfectly made-up eyes. “Yes, he is.”
“No, he’s not.” I smiled at her to show that I meant her no ill will. I don’t usually argue with children—I’m actually rarely around them, except for my super’s daughter, Gabriella, who takes care of my cat, Miss Kitty, for me when I’m away. But I had been assured multiple times by my agent on this point, and Rosie was never wrong. “Will Price isn’t attending this festival. I know he owns a house on Little Bridge Island, but he’s in Croatia right now, on the set of the film of his latest book.”
His latest piece of sentimental garbage was what I wanted to say, but I didn’t, because it’s rude to bad-mouth a fellow writer’s work (out loud), something Will Price had evidently never been taught, since he’d felt free to bad-mouth my work to one of the most highly circulating newspapers in the world.
“No.” Jasmine was holding firm. “Will does have a house on Little Bridge. Well, technically, a mansion on a private island off the coast of Little Bridge. And he was in Croatia filming the movie version of his latest book, The Moment—”
“Oh my God.” The girl in the vest looked like she was about to have an out-of-body experience right there on the plane. “You guys. The Moment is my favorite Will Price book of all time. When Johnny finally tells Mel the truth—that he’s loved her from the moment he first saw her—and that the reason they can never be together is because he’s the one who—”
Lauren punched her friend in the arm. “Cassidy, stop. God, spoiler alert! Some of these people may not have read it yet!”
Most of the people in the first-class cabin looked as if they had no interest in reading anything by Will Price. Most of them looked much more interested in their alcoholic beverages, and in the girls returning to their seats so that they could finish those drinks in peace before we began preparations for landing and the flight attendant took them away.
“But I guess Will is back, or, like, on his way back,” Jasmine went on, “because he posted to his fans this morning that he wouldn’t miss the island’s first book festival for anything.”
What?
I closed my eyes. No. This was not happening.
Except that it was.
Great. Freaking fantastic. So Will Price was going to be at this book festival. Despite Rosie’s promise, I was going to have to see him—not only see him, but probably be in a room with him, and even have to talk to him.
Kill me. Please kill me now.
“I. Am. So. Excited!” Cassidy’s out-of-body experience was turning into divine ecstasy along the lines of Saint Teresa’s. “Now I can get my copy of The Moment signed! And maybe ask Will to sign my chest. You know he’s hetero, right? And single.”
“Ugh, gross, Cassidy.” Lauren looked offended on behalf of her friend. “He’s, like, old.”
Cassidy grinned. “Not too old for me.”
Great. How super for her.
I, however, was going to drown myself. As soon as the plane landed, I was going to walk out of the airport and fill my pockets with stones and then wade into the ocean and drown myself like Virginia Woolf.
A stern male voice rang out, startling all of us and causing me to fling open my eyes.
“Okay, girls. That is it.” The flight attendant had had enough.
Ignoring the girls’ cries of protest, he shooed them back to their seats, then returned and firmly closed the curtain separating the first-class cabin from coach.
“I’m so sorry about that, Miss Wright,” he said to me, sounding like he meant it.
“Oh, please. It’s fine.” I gave him an It-happens-all-the-time smile and wave.
But of course, it didn’t happen all the time. It used to happen all the time, but not anymore. Not since so many readers of Kitty Katz, Kitten Sitter—which at one time had been the number one bestselling book series for tweens, an animated television series (on cable), and even a feature film (straight to streaming and DVD)—had grown up and started flocking to Will Price’s stupid, depressing books and even stupider, more depressing movies.
I downed the rest of my drink then lowered my eye mask, leaning back against my headrest. What was I worrying about, anyway? I wasn’t going to have to see Will Price. Rosie was right: All I had to do was give my speech, do my signing, maybe take a dip or two in the hotel pool—hey, it was January and below freezing in New York; it was seventy-five and sunny on Little Bridge Island—collect my ten thousand dollars, and go home.
And maybe … just maybe … I might even try out this famous Little Bridge tropical breeze I’d heard so much about, and see if it gave me the inspiration to write Kitty Katz #27.
Everything was going to be fine. Just fine. All I needed to do was have a pawsitive attitude. That’s what Kitty Katz would do. With the right attitude, Kitty always says, everything will be purr-fect!
Right?
CHAPTER THREE
Wrong.
Little Bridge Island was so small that it didn’t have a proper airport, with Jetways that stretched from the arrivals terminal to meet incoming planes so that passengers could disembark.
Instead, we were supposed to climb down a steep flight of metal stairs that airport personnel had shoved up against the door, then walk out onto an active runway.
This would have been charming and even fun, like something from Kitty Katz #12, Kitty Goes Hawaiian, when Kitty and her friends went to Meowuai, if I’d checked a bag.
But after years and years of work-related travel, I’d learned never to check a bag, because it so often got lost right before a super-important Kitty-related event. I’d once been forced to speak before a thousand Barnes & Noble booksellers in jeans and a Stay Puft Marshmallow Man T-shirt because that’s what I’d been wearing on the plane and my bag was nowhere to be found.