“Just leave.”Please,I think, but don’t say.
Edward’s head drops, his gaze on the floor. He pushes himself to stand and heads toward the sliding door and onto the terrace without another word.
44Florence
Andrew’s dozing on the couch, the first time he’s ever fallen asleep in front of me, the first time we’ve been silent together. Before, there was always chatter or music—what I’m writing or what’s blasting on the speakers.
It’s so quiet that the song I haven’t thought about for days snakes its way back into my head.
Just you wait, I’m gonna get her back
But he’s never gonna get me back.
Joni fucking Jewell. Right this very minute, she’s probably on a private plane, jetting from one tour stop to the next, her band getting high a few rows behind her while she pretends not to notice because she’ssuch a good girl. Maybe she’s faking sleep like I did when I was the one on planes and tour buses, when I was too exhausted to talk to anyone, sick and tired of the drugs that would wake me up for showtime.
The truth is that I didn’t love getting high. I did it because it was expected, and sure, the right drugs would put pep in my step when I was too tired or let me sleep when I was too wired. I did it because the drugs would numb me out when the real world was too much to take. But eventually, I did drugs mostly because it was part of the persona I created, the character I was playing, the one with the (fake) blond hair and the (rehearsed) dirty mouth and the (self-selected) better name. The woman who never turned down a party and never apologized for causing a scene.
But all along there was a tiny little person inside me, someone I kept hidden like a secret. A person who dreamed of a quiet life with her husband, her child, a life in which she’d make music just because she loved it, not to sell out stadiums or even pay the bills.
That person would never have thrown her guitar at Joni Jewell, would never have screwed Joni’s boyfriend, would never have been on the roof of the Roosevelt Hotel instead of tucked into her own bed, listening to her child’s breathing through the thin walls of their old house.
The tiny person only comes out at times like this, when it’s so quiet that I can hear her soft voice, telling me to go home, quit the business, sell the house, take my kid to the middle of nowhere and raise her where no one knows my name.
My husband and I used to talk about living that way someday. Maybe he got sick and tired of waiting. Maybe if I’d found that life for us sooner—if I were willing to give up thebright lights, big city—he wouldn’t have left.
I sit up, shaking my head.
Probably all celebrities have voices like that once in a while, imagining anormallife away from the flashbulbs and the marquee billing.
Anyhow, just because that voice istheredoesn’t mean it’s what I reallywant.
If it were, then why has my other voice—my big voice—always been so much louder?
Except right now, my big voice is silent, and the tiny voice won’t shut up, and I can’t tell which is the real me.
I slide off the couch and crawl on my hands and knees, almost crying out when I bang an elbow on the edge of the coffee table.
I reach for Andrew’s jeans, crumpled on the floor. I smell weed and sweat and cheap cologne, plus the fancy organic soap that’s on the kitchen counter. I stick my hand into his pocket and pull out his phone. I don’t know why I’m being sneaky: Over the past few nights, Andrew and I have had sex on every surface in this room. We’ve broken plenty of rules already.
Callie has a Google alert for every version of my name—married, stage, maiden. She keeps track of my husband’s mentions, my kid. For years, she’s been the one to tell me anything I need to know.
Now, I google myself. I click on the first link, aPeoplemagazine article.
“I apologize,” the former pop star tellsPeopleexclusively. “Joni Jewell is a rising talent in the industry, and she deserves my respect. I’ve checked myself into a facility to finallymaintain my sobriety and learn to manage my anger, and I wish Joni all the best for her tour this year. ‘Get Her Back’ is a brilliant song—congratulations, Joni!”
The tiny voice vanishes. The big voice is screaming.
Former pop star?
Congratulations,Joni?
Abrilliantsong?
Manage my anger?
Finallymaintain my sobriety?
I scroll down to the comments section. Surely my fans have flooded the page with conspiracy theories: They know me well enough to know I’d never say anything like that.
