Take Two (20 page)

Matt

“Matt! Matt! Have you agreed on the pre-nup yet? Can you talk? Why did you need throat surgery? Try not to get another parking ticket! Did Selena buy you this car? Where are you going?” the paparazzi surrounded my Lamborghini
.

I put my shades on and honked. They reluctantly backed away and kept shouting their annoying questions.

I turned my music all the way up and drove away. I was late picking Selena u
p for my
school’s graduation
and a part of me w
anted to “forget” and go straight to the school
.

It was Joan’s off day so
I was running behind schedule.
I woke up late, forgot to meet with
Shelby, and missed a phone interview with
Travel and Leisure
.

The only thing
I didn’t forg
et to do was think about Melody.
I cou
ldn’t get her out of my head.

I wished she had invited me in
to her room
or come back with me to my yacht. She
was developing
a habit of leaving me at the oddest moments, but I liked that.

I pulled in front of Selena’s condominium
and called her
.
“I’
m outside and
so are your
friends
.
”

“I’ll be right out.”

Photographers swarmed my car, yelling
a myriad of
questions that I couldn’t hear. I never understood why they felt they had a right to know what was going on in my life. Just because I was famous didn’t mean that I had an obligation to
shar
e my personal life with everyone
. Then again, I put myself in that
predicament
by opening up in the first place.

Selena’s security guard parted through the
sea of
annoyers and opened the passenger door. For some reason, Selena looked like she was act
ually pregnant—
a small bump was protruding
from
underneath
her
dress. She smiled and slid into the seat.

“Thanks, Bennie!” she
shouted
as security
shut the door. “Hello Matt.”

I sped off. “What
the hell
is that under your shirt?”

“It’s a baby bump.”

“What! I thought you said that—”

“It’s a prosthetic, Matt. Calm down.”

“You’re wearing a fake baby bump?”

“Yeah, I can’t
be
pregnant and not
look
pregnant!
This is a three month bump. I
t’s not even that big.”

“You’
re a piece of work, you know that?”

“Can we stop at CVS on the way back?”

“For?”

“A craving run. You need to run in and get me pickles and ketchup. Apparently that’s what all pregnant women eat.”

“Selena, this is the last time you and
I will be spending
time together,” I stopped at a red light.
“Get your assistant to go to CVS for you.”

“What? What are saying?”

“I’m saying that I can’t—I’m not going to do this anymore.
I’
m
mov
ing
on. I hope you didn’t buy a dress. It’s over.”

“No, it’s not. The light’s green.”

I pressed the gas
. “I just said it’s
over
. What part don’t you understand?”

She didn’t speak. She sat
with her arms crossed and looked out
side
her window.

When we were
three blocks away, she sighed.
“
We both signed the contract and
I already confirmed our wedding with Oprah’s network.”

“Well, cancel it. I’m sure Oprah will understand
. Maybe you can work out a one on one interview about being heartbroken. You
can even make
me
out
to be the bad guy.”

“I promised
the Children’s Hospital we would donate the proceeds from our wedding to the
ir canc
er
department
. That’s easily seventeen million. Are you really going to yank that
money
away from children, Matt? From
children
?”

“Selena,” I pulled into the garage at Sterling Academy. “
Really? Are you seriously
sitting here and trying to guilt
me with
money
? D
idn’t I make ninety million last year? And one
hundred
twenty the year before that? I’ll write them a check.”

“You’re going through with this wedding, Matt.”

“No,” I put
the
car
in park
. “I’m not.”

“Matt, we started this together
and we’re going to end it
together
.”

“Exactly. This is the end.”

I unbuckled my seatbelt and Selena grabbed my arm. She
twisted her face into a horrid
expression and glared at me.

“I swear
Matt. I swear I will have my assistan
t beat me with a sack of rocks
,
rough me up
,
and blame it on you.”

“Okay, you’re officially insane. Are you coming in or not?”

“Don’t test me.
I’
ll do it
and your career will be completely over. I don’t think America is to
o
keen on forgiving woman beaters, especially one that kills an unborn child in the process.”

I laughed. “Are you serious? Look, what we had in the beginning was great. I damn near loved you
and really
wanted to be with you. But then our careers took off and—”

“And you took advantage of me just like I took advantage of you! You
used
me, Matt! It wasn’t all
me
! You wanted to be seen in certain places and doing certain things and I showed up every single time. Every. Single. Time.”

“
W
e don’t even like each other anymore. Why are you making this—”

“
You
don’t like
me
anymore,” she cried. “I never stopped having feelings for you. Even when you started being distant and not wanting me around
so much
, I still…I thought it would
eventually
go back to how it used to be between us. I knew you were tired of
all
the press but I thought
you and I were still friends.”

“We can still be fr
iends
.”

“You know what I mean.
You think I like l
iving like this? Staging my life
for the ca
meras? Jumping at every exposure
opportunity
?”

“Don’t you?”

“Fame is all I have
. This is it
. This makes me feel like I’m important, like people really care about me
.
And the one person I considered to be my friend is threatening to take that all away.”

“
I’
m not taking anything away
.
Y
ou h
ave your
parents
. T
hey were at
our engagement party. They care about you.”

“I hired those people. T
hey were
actors
.
You know my parents and I don’t
speak.”

“I’m sorry if I ever hurt you
,” I caressed her face. “
I never wanted to do that. I didn’t know you still had feelings for me, but I don’t feel that way about you anymore. I don’t want to
go through
with
this charade past today.
”

“That’s too bad
. I hope you’ll change your mind by the end of this ceremony,” she
unclicked
her seatbelt and
opened
the
door.

I got out of the
car and waited for
her
.
As if they were o
n cue, the paparazzi
rushed towards
us. Selena
grabbed my hand and we both smiled as if
that
conversation n
ever happened
—it was so natural, so routine.

“What were you doing in St. Bart’s?” she whispered through her teeth.

“A video of you dancing with the graduates has gone viral,” Joan pulled my drapes open. “
Breakfast is on its way…
Do you wan
t to cancel your appearance
? You don’t look too good.”

“No, I’m okay. Thanks.”

“Well,
the car will be here
in two
hour
s
. Make
sur
e you
smile
throughout
the entire interview
, regardless of what they ask. They’ll be trying to sens
e
vulnerability
.”

“
I’ll remember that
,” I dragged myself out of bed and i
nto my bathroom. Joan was right.
I
didn’t look too good,
I looked terrible.

I
didn’t
get any sleep
the night before
. I
nstead, I
wasted
five hours arguing with Selena over the phone, failing to break away from her like I
’d
planned. S
he wasn’t joking
about staging domestic abuse.

How did it get to this point?

I
stepped into the
shower and stood under freezing cold water
.
It usually made me feel better, but not today.

Today
I was going to be on
“
The View
,
”
thanks to Shelby and a last minute drop out by Ashton Kutcher. Shelby thought it would be a great time to promote my upcoming book, a book I had no hand in writing.

I
read twenty pages of the final draft
last week
and wanted to rip my eyes out. The ghostwriter
couldn’t write to save her life. Sin
ce I didn’t have the time
to write it myself
and the publisher was expecting a product, I would have to live with her pitiful version of my life story.

“Mr. Sterling?” Joan
handed me a towel. “The stylist is here.”

“I’ll be right out.
Hey Joan?”

“Yes?”

“After the interview, will we have time to stop by—”

“Miss Carter
hasn’t returned to work yet
.”

“Could you turn to the side a bit, Mr. Sterling?”
the assistant
tapped his lip. “Maria! Maria! The lighting is wrong! We
need to fix this before she gets
here!”

I mentally vanished from the room. Photogr
apher extraordinaire Anne Leibov
itz was shooting me for
Vogue
and I couldn’t have cared less. I was honored to finally meet
her, but my week was off to a horrible start and
all I
wanted to
do was
sit in my apartment and relax.

I barely made it through
Monday’s
interview on
“
The View
”
without
shouting, “We’re not really a couple! Please shu
t up!” The questions about the baby
and th
e wedding
just kept coming. They even managed to put together a short segment ab
out what we should name our kid
. One of the names was Matlena.

On Tuesday
,
I shot the final scene for
Wherever You Are
,
greeting the legion
of fans
that
showed
up to watch me run through Central Park half naked. I even
stayed behind after we wrapped.
I signed autographs and took pictures with as many fans as I could. I went on two “craving runs” that night: one for ketchup and pickles, one for hard liquor.