I oblige, leaning forward to turn it off, and put the phone back into my pocket.
“You want a budget,” Rowland says, leaning back in his chair even further with an expression of disapproval as if I just asked for his only daughter’s hand in marriage, “for an unsigned artist, who may not even go with us—”
“I told you, she’ll sign with us when I tell her to. I can call her in right now. But this video will be an act of good faith. Trust me, she’s worth it. You already have proof,” I say, leaning forward in my chair as I try to convince him.
“Based on what?” Rowland says, a smile on his face. He can’t hide how much he enjoys playing his power games. He puts his feet up on the floor and his hands behind his head. “A few college DJs? A few industry types who wouldn’t know the street if it smacked them in the face?”
“It doesn’t have to be a big budget. She’s talented. We should make the investment while we can.”
“You mean take the risk. Then it’s my ass on the line instead of yours.”
“It’s no risk. It’s just a small amount of money that we’re sure to get back. If we capitalize on this.”
“Excuse me? Last I checked I’m the one who decides what to do with this company’s finances – my finances. And given your track record, I can’t say I have much faith in this girl. Does she even have any talent, or are you just blowing smoke up my ass for your latest flavor of the week?”
Something inside me sparks up, the thing that I suppress every time I walk into Rowland’s office. I lean forward slowly, my face blank, and say the next two words slowly.
“Fuck you.”
They taste delicious.
Every part of Rowland’s face drops. He drops his feet off the desk, puts his palms on it, and leans forward.
“I’m sorry? Did you just—”
“You heard me. You’re not deaf – although that would explain a lot of things.”
I stand up, and Rowland instinctively backs up a little.
“Who do you think you are?” he manages to say, though his voice is weak and nasal. “Have you forgotten that I’m your boss?! I pay you!”
“I know what I am. It might have taken me a while to figure it out, but I know. I also know what I’m not. I’m not a cowardly parasite that doesn’t believe in anything, or anyone. I’m not a jumped-up rich kid with an inferiority complex he has to keep hidden behind a big office and lousy power-plays.”
I turn around and start walking for the door.
“You’re fired, Brando!” Rowland calls behind me. “You’ve just made a big mistake!”
This time it’s me who raises my arms out wide as I step toward the door.
“So why do I feel fucking great?”
Chapter 14
Haley
“You said that?”
Brando nods and takes another lick of his ice cream cone, his smile framed against the endless ocean. The dusty-orange light of the setting sun carves out his perfectly-proportioned face so sublimely I feel like I’m living in an Instagram photo.
We carry on down the boardwalk, working on our ice cream cones, feeling light and happy. Every second a perfect moment that seems to linger before it gives way to another.
“So what are you now? Are you still my manager?” I say as we start walking up the pier, almost reluctant to break the comfortable silence between us.
“I guess,” Brando says, sucking the end of his finger in a way that makes me wish he’d asked me first. “I was never that good of an A & R guy anyway. I like artists too much to exploit them.”
I laugh a little. “’Too much’ is one way of putting it… Thanks, though. I appreciate you sticking up for me.”
“I did it just as much for myself as for you. If I was really smart I’d have kissed his ass until he handed me the budget. But…”
“But that doesn’t exactly come easy to you, right?”
Brando sits on the bench at the end of the pier and looks up at me, smiling.
“I guess we’re both discovering what our limits are.”
Brando points his dark-brown eyes at me in a way I haven’t seen yet. I stand a few feet in front of him, feeling the salt air fill my lungs, enjoying his devoted attention, wondering how bad news can feel like good news when you’ve got the simple things right.
“So it’s just you and me now? We’re going it alone?” I say, having to look at him through my wind-blown hair.
“In case you hadn’t noticed, it’s been that way from the start.”
I smile shyly and put a hand on my beach skirt as it blows against my skin. I didn’t feel like my regulation jeans and dark t-shirt today. It was a snap decision to wear this light-blue, almost see-through skirt, and a tight white tank top with a denim jacket over it. The kind of decision a girl makes much more easily when she’s getting some.
“What’s the next step then?”
“We still need a video,” Brando says, still studying me like I’m the Sistine chapel. His look makes me feel naked, but the stranger thing is that I don’t mind.
I squinch up my face. “How? You said it yourself, we have no budget. Nothing. Maybe we can borrow some equipment, but don’t we need a director? Lighting guys? A studio? I don’t know, videos seem like—”
“You look so beautiful right now,” Brando says, his voice cutting through mine like a soft punch.
I look down at my feet, wondering if it’s normal for an adult woman to blush this much.
“The way your hair falls over your face,” he continues, as if in a trance, “the way your eyes catch the light and hold it. You always look amazing, but right now, right here, out in the light, I can see the magic around you.”
I look around to see if anyone else is nearby, embarrassed but smiling like I’m guilty of getting away with something.
“Anyway…we were talking about the video?” I say, looking back at Brando. He’s holding his phone out in front of him. Filming me. “Oh no! No no no!”
“Yeah,” Brando says, standing up, his face expressing pure, mischievous glee. “About that video…”
I hide my face behind my hands, turning away and taking a few steps back down the pier. Brando follows, his hand still holding the phone steady.
“Brando! Put the phone away!” I say, but I’m laughing as I say it, and the way his eyes narrow as they flick between the screen and mine lets me know how much he’s enjoying this.
“If you look one tenth as good on film as you do in real life, this is gonna be amazing.”
“Come on!” I say, pleading as I twirl around to face him, walking backwards away from the camera, before turning back around to walk down the pier.
Brando steps in front of me, so now he’s walking backwards, and I’m walking towards the camera. He winks, and I try not to smile, try not to laugh. Try not to let Brando make me feel so playful and happy, as if this could actually happen.
“How about a little dance?” Brando says from behind the lens. I stop and give him a look that says ‘no,’ before covering my face with my hands again, hiding behind my hair. “Or act shy,” he says. “That works too.”
I continue to walk, Brando still filming me head-on as he steps backwards carefully.
“Okay,” I say, talking to the camera lens, “you win. We’ll do the video like this.” I get just close enough, and then snatch the phone away from him. He freezes on the spot, his hands still out in front of him, holding a phone that isn’t there anymore. “On one condition,” I say, raising the phone and pointing the lens at him, “you’re gonna be in it too.”
I watch him on the phone screen as he drops his hands to his side, and gives me a picture-perfect, cover-shoot sexy, incredibly photogenic smile.