I open my mouth to tell him to fuck off or to shut his ugly face. But I don’t do that. Instead, I let a little bit of the truth slip out.
“Am I that obvious?”
“Yes,” he says, and he nudges my leg with one of his smelly socks. “And it’s actually really fucking nice to see. Inspiring almost.”
“Inspiring?” I scoff. “You’reinspiredby me?”
“Yeah,” he says, pulling another cigarette out with his lips. “You make this old man want to fall in love too. Or rather, again. With more success this time.”
“Jon.” I stretch closer to him, snatch the lighter and open it for him. As he leans into the flame, I hold his gaze. “May I recommend starting with wearing clean socks?”
“Noted,” he says as he exhales and relaxes back. “So, what are you going to do?”
“What am I going to do about what?”
“Miss Cassie Everard,” he says and points with his cigarette at the cassette player on the table next to us. “1980’s best-selling artist.”
I pull the demo cassette that she had couriered to our hotel in Chicago. I hold it like it’s her hand, delicately, warmly, wanting to squeeze it so hard, but also wanting to protect it from any kind of pain or threat.
“WhatcanI do?”
“You can…” He comes up short, because of course he does. We don’t live in a world where Cassie and I can be what we want to be.
“Maybe things will be different in a few years,” I say, finally voicing a thought that’s been bouncing around my head since I left LA. “Femme Fatale will be over and done with. We’ll have all fallen out and gone our separate ways. She’ll be more popular than ever. Maybe I can just go on tour with her. Maybe I can cook her meals, wash her socks.” I flick Jon’s big toe before reaching for the cigarettes again. So much for giving up smoking on this tour. “It will be enough. Just to be with her.”
“That’s cute,” Jon says as he returns the favour and gives me a light. “But fucking bullshit. Pia, that is not you. You are no housewife. And you weren’t meant to stand in someone’s shadow. Even if you adore that person.”
“I don’t know, Jon,” I say, honesty now pouring out of me. “In case you haven’t already noticed, being in the spotlight isn’t all it’s supposed to be.”
Jon studies me with an assessing stare as he takes a long drag. “What are you afraid of? It’s common knowledge that you’ve fucked women. You’ve even hinted at it in our songs and in interviews. Why are you afraid now?”
He doesn’t get it. Nobody gets it.
“A girl can want too much,” I say, trying to sound philosophical, but to my ears, I just sound weak and pathetic.
“Bullshit, Pia, bullshit.”
“I’m serious, Jon,” I retort. Because I am. As well as everything else, it’s still true that I feel like I already have more than I deserve right now in this moment where my heart aches to be close to hers, to fall into the same rhythm. It still blows my mind that she feels the same. That she wants to be with me.
“And I’m serious about calling you out on this bullshit. I’ll allow you your sobriety and that doe-eyed, loved-up look on your face. I’ll let you spend half your time daydreaming about the sordid things you want to do to Cassie Everard. I’ll even let you insult my hygiene habits. What I will not permit is you shrinking yourself because of other people’s bigotry. That is the very last thing the Pia Lindberg I know would ever do.”
I flinch like I’ve been slapped across the face. Instead of replying, I suck on my cigarette. Once, then twice.
“Maybe you’re right,” I say eventually. “But what about Cassie Everard?”
Jon repositions himself again, bringing his feet closer to his body. He bends down to take a sniff. He looks as repulsed as he should. When he straightens up, he gives me a shrug and a gentle smile. “That, I guess, is up to Cassie Everard.”
CHAPTER 38
CASSIE
Idon’t want to open my eyes. I don’t want the note Clarence just played to end. I don’t want to be blinded by the studio lights and bothered by an influx of voices. I don’t want to be pulled out of the reverie in my mind where I am singing to Pia and she is in my arms and there’s no-one else.
But the final note does eventually end. And a voice crackles in my headphones. I open my eyes and see three people moving around, and not one of them is Pia.
“Excellent work, Cassie,” Freddie says. “We’re going to take a break now. Go get a drink or whatever.”
I nod acknowledgement in the direction of the sound desk before removing and hanging my headphones up. Clarence is also on the move, and he meets me at the exit, holding the door open for me.