The Real Real (17 page)

“This is where they want us to sit. It’s where the shot’s set up.” Melanie rotates onto her back and re-smoothes the towel beneath her.

“Well, I want to lay out over there.” Trisha points at the lounge chair positioned closest to the bar, in Jase’s direct sight line.

“Why do you have to be such a drama?” Melanie sighs.

“Why do you have to be such a kiss-ass?” Trisha fumbles 167

in her gold Marc Jacobs bag to withdraw a pack of Camel Lights.

“Because my mother can’t just write a check for someone to rearrange my face,” Melanie retorts calmly as she closes her eyes.

Trisha covers her flicking lighter and takes a deep inhale. “Jealous much?”

“Hey, guys!”

We look over to see Kara shoving through the huge doors, flip-flops flapping. A tray of Coronas in one hand, she also holds a Styrofoam cup to her chest over her new tropical uniform of V-neck white T-shirt and frayed army shorts.

“I had to,” I say apologetically from the chlorinated water as she arrives at our chairs.

“What? Oh, fine. You’re tan enough.”

In one move, Melanie tosses off her glasses, whips off her scarf, leaps up, and dives over my head.

Kara peers at us from under the brim of her XTV baseball cap. “Uh, Trisha? No.” Kara circles her coffee cup in front of Trisha, who reluctantly drops her smoke in to fizzle. “This is a round on Fletch,” she says, offering up the beers. “Since most of you guys’re legal down here.

And now if you want to sit closer to the boys that would also not suck. Fletch isn’t thrilled with the seventh-grade dance vibe we’ve got going on here.” Trisha takes a beer and a lime slice. “And a heads-up that Fletch and Zacheria are finalizing the rest of the week as we speak, and we’re gonna shoot some really exciting scenes tomorrow now 168

that you guys’ve had a chance to chill, loosen up.”

Melanie surfaces next to me. Holding on to the wall with one arm, she wipes the water off her face. “I love this pool.”

“Beer?” I ask her, reaching for the one Kara has set by the ledge.

She shakes her head. “Not eighteen yet.”

“Good girl,” Kara says. “So I need to plan you hanging for your last afternoon of b-roll. Maybe I can get a volleyball net.”

“Does it have to be as a group?” I ask. “I mean, can’t we split up and do different things?”

“Or we can play volleyball . . . ” Melanie tries, like this might get her the A on this pop quiz.

“Great.” Kara scribbles on her clipboard. “We’ll set up some sporting equipment for you. And, Jesse, please, no more footage of you behind a textbook, okay?” Kara tucks her pen over her ear and circles around to update the bar crew.

“Told you I could sit over there. Later, bitches.” Trisha totters off after Kara, readjusting her C-cups.

“Was Trisha always this charming?” I ask Melanie as she scissors her legs beside me. “I mean, she seemed this charming from afar. Just wondering if this delightful love of a girl came with the boobs.”

“She’s just Trisha. Only now she’s just Trisha with a lot to prove. I mean, everyone knows they cast me and Nico and not her the first time. Whatever. I don’t let her get to me.” I watch her focus on her watercize and think back to 169

all those framed pictures in Nico’s room, Mel and Trish looking as close as Nico and Trish. Were their friendships just alliances of convenience that kept them in charge? Or was it real and XTV simply exposed the inevitable cracks that crop up after fifteen years? Exposed and exploited.

With my help. I hold on to the side, spinning myself to face the water, wondering for the first time if Caitlyn had been cast, would XTV still have found a way to split us up?

“Do you let anything get to you?” I ask Melanie as Trisha forgoes the walk-up side of the bar to hunker on the edge of the swim-up side, her lot-to-prove squeezed together at Jase’s eye level. Nico notices. Drew notices her noticing.

“Sure. I just don’t let it get in the way.”

I nod, deciding Melanie knows more than any of us.

The next afternoon, in my fourth costume change, I step into the frostily air-conditioned elevator and cross my arms over the chocolate-zebra-print organza tunic. “Cover-up, my butt.” I jerk my finger into the lobby button and huddle in the cold, cursing the freezing gold bracelets that have been copiously stacked up my arm. Who goes for a walk on the beach with this much jewelry? Or this much makeup? A hooker hoping for a passing yacht?

I miss yesterday afternoon. I miss laying around in my own suit, the one that stays put on my ass without double-sided tape, and sleeping. By the pool, in the cabana, in the room. I don’t care if it makes for bad television. It makes for great Jesse.

A floor down the doors open to the sky-view gym, and Drew steps in, startling when he sees me. “Hey.” He pats off his face with the towel around his neck and hits the penthouse button.

Oh, you remember me? “I’m going down.”

“I’ll take the ride.” He drops the towel and leans back against the railing. “Barbie Jesse returns.”

“Yeah.” I hold a fake nail to my new extensions. “Can’t say I missed her.”

He smiles. The elevator opens to a maid with an overflowing laundry cart who waves us on. The doors close.

“So.” Drew turns to me, clearing his throat. “Did I do something?”

“What? No. What do you mean?”

“I just mean you seem to vacate wherever I am, unless there’s a camera making it mandatory.”

I shake my head like I don’t know what he’s talking about.

“Jesse?”

“Just making more room for Nico.” I shrug.

“Oh.” He loops the towel over his neck and holds both ends, pulling it taut. “I thought maybe you were just making room for Jase.”

“What do you mean?” I feel the heat in my cheeks and am thankful for heavy concealer and dim elevator bulbs.

“I don’t hang out with Jase.”

“You said he was hot.” He stares at me.

“Nico’s thighs are touching your shoulder!” I sputter.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“Okay . . . just, Jase was talking shit about you, that’s all.”

OhmyGodOhmyGod. “Does Jase talk anything else?”

The doors open to the spa level. He waits for me to say something—but what? Yes, I hooked up with Jase? Yes, I cheated on my faux friend. My faux friend who seems to be lining you up as a backup even though—and maybe because?—I told her I liked you.

“I have to be down at the beach for my stroll with Trisha,” I say miserably. “Where we’ve been told she’s going to confide her growing feelings for Rick.”

“Fine. I’m gonna grab a steam before my shoot.” He steps out and the door starts to close before he darts his hand in. It rolls open. “Jesse.”

“Yeah?”

“We need to just hang out,” he says decisively.

I lean into the open button.

“Go for a walk with me tonight. I hear there’s going to be fireworks, and I’m sick of seeing Trisha get hosed down at the clubs.”

“What time?” I ask as the door starts to beep and to my total surprise his face lights up like it did for Nico.

Maybe brighter.

“Without the cameras. I’ll sneak out of the club and meet you down by the cabanas at, like, eleven thirty.”

“Eleven thirty at the cabanas!” I repeat giddily as the doors force their way closed.

* * *

That night, having fulfilled my obligation to Zacheria with a Dior-clad trip to the casino with Melanie, I sit under the full moon on the sand among the striped canvas huts, pressing my lips together and questioning the relatively low stickiness factor of just one coat of gloss. I am completely losing the ability to gauge appropriate makeup application.

Getting ready in the room, I stared at the fresh crop of freckles on my nose and felt like a total loser because I can’t operate an airbrush machine.

Whatever. Drew said “Barbie Jesse” with a tone. A tone that implied un-Barbied was better, and so here I sit on a striped deck chair, in a pair of Melanie’s navy short shorts and my stretched-out white sweater, listening to the waves while scanning the hotel horizon in search of my date.

What time is it? The moon is definitely a lot higher than when I got out here. But if I go all the way to the lobby, I might miss him if he walks back from town on the beach.

Wait—there’s a clock next to the pool bar TV.

I swipe up my leather flip-flops and corner around the cabanas—slowing when I hear Trisha’s piercing giggle. I squint down to the silvery waterline to see her up to her calves in the waves, twirling her dripping tank overhead like a lasso. She lets it fly, attempting a swerving striptease for someone sitting in the sand. At this point you’d think her sales pitch would be having the rare treat of seeing her with her clothes
on
.

I turn away, head up the steps to the pool area and toward the blue light of the bar, which illuminates the 173

turquoise water surrounding it. I cock my head at the melody coming from the potted palm. Yes, here we are again in Margaritaville. Making my way around the periphery of the glowing water, I bend to check the time cloaked in wavy shadows—12:05. Is he not coming? Could he not get away without the cameras? Is that him down on the beach with Trisha?

“Hola.” The bartender puts down his novel and walks over to me.

“Hi. Did you by any chance see the boy with brown hair from our group”—I gesture to the empty chaises he and Nico have been camped on for the last two days—

“head down to the beach?”

“I haven’t seen anyone. Sorry, miss. I make you something?” He picks up a cocktail shaker and tosses it from hand to hand.

Why not? “Yes.”

“Something sweet?” He grabs a tall tiki glass and juggles them together.

“Something strong.”

Staring into the melting ice crystals, I’m not sure how many minutes have passed when I hear, “Nico, please.”

With a coldness moving up my chest fueled by the alcoholic slushie I’ve just downed, I set my emptied glass on the cement and follow the low voices along the hedge to the gurgling pineapple-shaped hot tub on the terrace’s edge. Rounding the corner to see Drew’s back, I dart behind the cover of the leaves.

“I told you I can do it, too. Watch!”

I look past his broad shoulders to where Nico teeters on the tub’s steps in the white tank dress that just barely grazes her butt. She drops her hand to cup the water, conjuring Trisha. “Come here,” she demands softly.

“Nico, we need to talk.” He sounds sad. I know, it must be so tragic for you that she’s still in her dress.

“You talk. You talk and talk and talk.” She jerks back on the step, and he bolts forward. Her hand catches on the metal rail, and she swings around like a rag doll into the bubbles, the white cotton soaking through to reveal the black lace of what’s beneath. “Whoops!” she exclaims.

He bends down, says something I can’t hear.

“Or this.” She pulls his face into a kiss so deep the breath is knocked out of me.

Double-fisting, I carefully slide my two emptied tiki glasses on to the entry table in the dark penthouse. The warm, salty air billows through the open balcony, sending the sheer curtains flapping laterally over the couches. I swerve over to see Melanie passed out on her bed. I should wake her up, tell her what I’ve seen! No. I have to . . . screw.

Him. Just screw him. I’m going to tell Jase, how about that? I’m going to . . . I register that my hand is slapping against the boys’ bedroom door. Well, good. Because Jase can answer and I’m going to—

He pulls back the paneled wood and raises his hand along its side, cheeks flushed, shirt off. I hear Rick snoring in the dark behind him.

“Jase,” I start, tequila warmth swimming in every direction along with shards of that kiss. “I . . . I wanted to—”

“Me too.” He slides his hot hand around my waist and pulls me against him, his lips taking mine.

I bushwhack through the thickness in my head. “That’s not—this isn’t—”

“Okay.” And just like that he releases me and closes the door.

I stand in the dark living room, gulping for air, my skin on fire. Suddenly the room bursts with a series of brilliant crackles from the beach outside, fireworks echoing off the stucco walls around me. I go to knock, but before my hand touches the wood, the door opens.

“Nico and Drew in the hot tub,” I say, my eyes wetting. “I did.” I nod my head. “I told Kara about you and Trisha. Back at the beginning. And now it’s messed up everything, and I’m sorry. But I didn’t—I never told her about your dad.” His face set on mine, eyes smoldering, Jase walks toward me as I back up into the living room, feeling behind me for the suite’s guest bathroom doorknob. It gives, and I reach out to him, my fingers catching at the belt loop of his shorts. We tumble together onto the cool tiles in the darkness inside, stopping only to reach up and push in the lock against the rest of them.

REEL 12

“
Well, aren’t we a talkative bunch,” Kara comments, carefully keeping her balance as she steps between Nico’s and my legs to grab a seat at the pointed bow of the speedboat we’ve been on for the last twenty minutes.

Last night’s tiki binge leaving me redefining hungover for an entire generation, I squint up at her through my borrowed Chloé glasses and grip my bench seat as if this might steady the hammering in my head from all the lifting and dropping over the white waves.

“I think you all could use some coffee.”

“I think we all could use some
not going so freaking
fast
.” Nico turns to the guy driving the speedboat while he chugs on his loathsome cigar. “Can you slow down,
por
favor
!”

“No, please.” Drew pats the air at her not to scream and pivots himself back out to face the water. Jase snores like he’s gargling furniture on the bench next to me, his iPod blasting in a tinny thump in time with my throbbing.

I close my eyes to shut out the three people I would most like never to look at again for the rest of my life. Mistake!

My stomach lurches.

“Oh, Jess, by the way, we got a fax from your mom this morning. You got into Georgetown.”