Fifteen Minutes: A Novel (9 page)

Kelly breathed in deep through her nose and adjusted her posture. She didn’t need this, didn’t need Cal making life difficult for her, didn’t need the memory of her father’s e-mail. This was the biggest gig she’d had in five years. She was making $5 million for her role as judge this season, and the pre-show publicity had shot her last three albums back to the top of the charts.

Calm. Everything’s okay, Kelly. It’ll be fine.
She exhaled and thought about her stylist and makeup artist waiting in the other room. She would go back to her chair and they would transform her, peel away the years so she was even more beautiful than she’d been in her twenties. In an hour she’d be in front of the cameras. Where she belonged. Where she had always belonged.
I don’t need Cal’s games. I’m on top of the world. I’m Kelly Morgan.

What does it profit you to gain the whole world and lose your soul?

Kelly jerked back as if she’d been struck by a bullet, straight to her very soul. Had someone said the words or was she only hearing them in her heart? And who was talking to her? She thought for a moment. The words were from . . . They were from the Bible, right? A message from her childhood. Scripture verses meant to make her feel guilty. Why would the words scrape
against her anxious heart now, when she didn’t believe any of them?

Her father’s e-mail. That had to be it. Stirring up ancient reminders of guilt and recrimination. The list of things she shouldn’t do. The choices that would send her to hell. She clenched her fists and released them.
Peace . . . take hold of peace, Kelly
. Her therapist had taught her the trick.
Clench and release. Clench and release. Peace is there for the taking.

She could hear the therapist’s voice from the tapes she had bought a month ago. She’d dropped three thousand dollars on them. The woman’s voice soothed her soul. “You have it all. You have goodness and health and beauty and wealth. Peace is yours. Take it. Own it. You define your truth. Choose positivity and energy. You are always master of your own destiny . . .” On and on and on.

Truth. Okay. Kelly clenched her fists and released them. Truth helped. She remained master of her own destiny. Yes, that was truth. Anything to get her mind off the Bible verse about losing her soul. She tapped her high-heeled toe in a rapid beat. The therapist’s truth . . . truth, truth, truth.

What else was true? She was in perfect health, fitter than she’d been at any time in her life. That was truth. That and the fact that her boyfriend was crazy about her. There . . . that was a start. Michael Manning was the hottest guy in music and he was completely in love with her. What else? She racked her brain.
People
magazine! Of course! She’d been voted one of
People
magazine’s most beautiful women the week after her role on
Fifteen Minutes
was announced. Next year she’d be on the cover. That was the sort of truth she needed to fill her mind with.

Peace began to wash over her.

Before she could return to the dressing room her phone rang again and the tension returned with a vengeance. Why couldn’t people leave her alone? Before she could throw it across the room a photo appeared on the home screen. She and Michael Manning locked in a passionate kiss.
Michael.
The guy had her heart. She took the call, silently chiding herself.
Peace is yours. Take it. Own it.
She found her most intimate tone. “Hey, sexy.”

“Hey, pretty girl.” Michael chuckled. “I’m higher than a kite, and you’re not here.”

“Mmmm.” Kelly closed her eyes and let her shoulder lean against the cool wall. The hallway was still empty, the moment hers and Michael’s. No one listening, no one taking pictures. “Where are you?”

“Morocco. Plushest hotel room ever. Just finished a meet and greet.” His voice was deep and slurred, the way he sounded when he first woke up. “A fan gave me the weed. It’s amazing.”

Kelly considered what else the fan might have given him. The fan was a girl, no doubt, like all of Michael’s followers. But how old? And had she followed him back to his hotel room?

“You there?”

“Hmm?” Kelly forced the thoughts from her mind.
He loves me only. Truth. Stay with the truth.
“Sorry. Just picturing you there . . . the room.” Her tone changed as she imagined him. “The bed.”

Michael groaned. “Don’t do that to me. Two weeks till I see you.”

“Then you’re home for a while.”

“In Nashville, yes. Unless you have a better idea.” He breathed deep. “Seriously, this is the greatest pot.”

Kelly was stuck back at the Nashville part. “I’ll be in New York City for the show.”

“I don’t have a place in the city.” His throaty chuckle filled her senses. “But if the most beautiful girl in the world lives there, then maybe I should look.”

She giggled. There was no way to measure the joy he brought her. Around him she felt young and beautiful and on top of the world. Like she always would be. “I might have a spare bedroom.”

“Mmmm. You asking me to move in with you?”

“Maybe.”

Before he could answer, the sound of other voices crowded the line. “Hold on, boo.” Frustration replaced the sleepiness in his voice.

“Is . . . someone there?”

“No. It’s housekeeping.” He was either nervous or much more sober. He cursed under his breath. “I have a privacy sign on the door.” He hesitated. “Hey, I like the live-in idea.” The calm in his tone returned but not the happy high. “I gotta go, okay? Get these people out of my room. I’ll call you later.”

She was about to explain that she’d be on camera for the next several hours, but he ended the call. A wave of uncertainty ran through her. Michael’s reputation had been scandalous before they started dating. He wouldn’t have fans in his room, right? Not when someone could catch him smoking, take a picture, and sell it to TMZ in an hour.

Either way she couldn’t say anything—it was one of his ground rules. Implicit trust. Michael loved his fans and he loved
smoking. Two nonnegotiable aspects of their relationship. Kelly closed her eyes again. What had he told her? He wouldn’t touch another girl as long as they were together.
When one of us is ready to move on, we say so. Love is freedom. No chains. When it ends, it ends. Until then, we trust.

Yes, that was truth. They had to trust each other. If he said the voices were housekeeping, then that’s what they were. She only wished she could be with him, with the good weed and the great room and the view of Morocco.

At first she worried about how much pot Michael smoked. But not anymore. Kelly had come to love it as much as he did, though she smoked only a couple times a month. Everyone in the industry smoked, but there was a cardinal rule for people in the brightest light, people like the two of them.

Don’t get caught.

Not in bed with her much younger boyfriend and not intoxicated. Not looking too fat or too thin or too old. Nothing that could be plastered in the tabloids and harm her contract with
Fifteen Minutes
.

Who were the voices in his room?

Breathe, Kelly
. She gave herself the order, but she struggled with the reality.
If I had some of that weed, maybe.

Your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit . . . honor God with your body.

What was this? She stood straighter, looking over her shoulder and down the hall as if she expected to see someone. Enough. The voices in Michael’s hotel room, the voice taunting her with outdated Bible verses. She took a deep breath.
You are successful and young and beautiful and famous
. There. That was the truth. She opened the door to the dressing room and swept
back to the chair, a smile on her face. For the rest of the day only one set of voices mattered.

The voices of the contestants.

REESE WEATHERLY WANTED
to turn off her phone and bury it out back behind the stable. Zack’s tweets were that frustrating. But she couldn’t. Other than one rushed conversation and a few short texts, Zack hadn’t talked to her. Very busy and all. Lots of demands. But somehow he’d had time for Twitter, time to update his followers and answer people who tweeted him.

People like this Zoey girl, whoever she was.

Reese took her phone out back, walked to the far fence and leaned against the worn wooden slats. She stared at the cloudy sky as if the answers might be there. Zack didn’t mean anything by the tweets. She knew that. He couldn’t help what other people said about him. Still, her heart hurt. It ached even while another part of her celebrated the fact that he’d made it through. She had seen this coming. The fact that Zack had made it this far was no surprise. Sometime in the next few hours he’d sing for the celebrity judges.

But Zack’s tweets were making Reese feel something she hated, something she had never felt around him. Jealousy. Reese pulled up the Twitter app on her phone and checked it once more. Zack had updated again.

In line waiting. Jesus, shine through me in front of the judges!

Reese could hear his voice, picture him standing in line, praying and telling the world about his faith. Despite the tension,
her heart relaxed. He was keeping his promise, making the journey about Jesus. She went to her saved searches and clicked @ZackDylan. That brought up a host of tweets aimed at Zack—most of them from Zoey, @songleader. She was relentless.

In line behind @ZackDylan. Oh. My. Word. Girls you’re gonna wanna know this guy!

Reese read down the list of the others from Zoey.

How am I supposed to sing with @ZackDylan warming up in front of me? The guy’s voice is as gorgeous as he is!

Hey everyone! Follow @ZackDylan. I’ll be home in no time. He’s gonna be famous. Longer than #FifteenMinutes!!

Conversation with @ZackDylan. Zack: “I have a girlfriend.” Me: “I don’t see a ring on your finger.” #allisfairinlove

Reese stared at the tweets, confused. Was the girl serious? She didn’t care that Zack had a girlfriend? Of course Zack had told Zoey he had a girlfriend. The girl was either obsessed or immature. Maybe both. Reese clicked Zoey’s profile for the sixth time. Long blond hair, cheerleader. Another few clicks and Reese could read everything Zoey’s friends tweeted to her in response. Most of them gushed about how they agreed with Zoey, how Zack was “so hot” and how they couldn’t wait to hear him sing.

All of them loved Zoey’s tweet from earlier today. The one where she had attached a photo of her and Zack. Reese tapped the app a few more times and saw the tweet again.

Here we are, me and the next #FifteenMinutes winner. That’s right, @ZackDylan. #BeJealous

Reese clicked open the photo and stared at it the way she had ten minutes ago. If she squinted at it long enough, she could convince herself that Zack looked uncomfortable. Disinterested. She stared at the photo until she couldn’t stand it another moment. She clicked out of the tweet. Zack was doing the girl a favor, taking a photo with his first new fan. Nothing more. Reese checked his Twitter profile. Zoey might’ve been the first, but she wasn’t alone. Zack had gone from two hundred followers to nearly a thousand in a few days.

Word was getting out.

Knots twisted at Reese’s stomach. She had to stop looking, had to stop thinking about Zack at the auditions with girls like Zoey squealing over him. It wasn’t that she was worried. Not at all. Zack loved her and no one else. A few days away weren’t going to change that.

But could they change him? If he made it far enough, would he be the same Zack? The one who loved watching her help little Toby find confidence on the back of a horse? The guy who cared about the progress his sister was making and who worried every day about his family’s horse farm? Would that Zack still exist?

She stared at her phone as another of Zack’s tweets came across.
I’m next. Pray for me! Here goes . . .

Reese looked at the words. Slowly, methodically, she turned off the phone and slipped it into the back pocket of her jeans. Zack wanted everyone to pray that he’d sing his heart out for the judges. Reese stared at the sky and did what Zack had asked her to do.

She prayed for him.

Not that he’d be the best singer or that this would be his brightest stage moment ever. She prayed for something else, something that mattered more.

For God’s will, whatever it was.

That above all else.

C
handra Olson sat back in her seat while her makeup artist worked a brush full of loose powder over her cheeks and forehead. Auditions were under way. Touch-ups for the camera happened after every ten singers or if any of the judges needed a break. This one was called by Kelly Morgan. Her recent Botox injections were making her shinier than usual. At least that’s what she said.

Chandra kept quiet, taking in the moment. Analyzing it.

The judges on the panel for the tenth season of
Fifteen Minutes
had been handpicked by the show’s infamous producer, Samuel J. Meier. Over the past decade, national singing competitions had come and international contests had gone. But
Fifteen Minutes
remained. The show had topped the ratings chart every year since its inception and after ten seasons everyone knew the reason for the show’s success.