Unscrewing the water’s cap, I swallowed down the little yellow pill with a little effort, then chugged the bottle.
“Mister Rivers?” A young voice chimed in. We all turned to find the female Beta from Paradise Pets, her arms laden down with packing material. “The trees are all done. Just let us know where you’d like them moved.”
“Yes!” Tray clapped his hands. “You’re going to hate me,” he gave the girl a winning smile, “but I ordered the wall cat tree too. It should be here in…” he pulled his phone out of his pocket to check, “like ten minutes. Delivery tracking says it left your store twenty minutes ago.”
The Beta guy came out from behind the girl. He held exactly one length of Styrofoam while his coworker was struggling under the weight of everything else. “That abstract, bonsai design with the hammocks?” The guy’s face looked mortified.
“Exactly,” Tray crowed in response. “We needed something different for the pack suite. Didn’t want to take up too much floor space. It’s going to look epic!”
The Beta girl held it together, not betraying her feelings. The guy though groaned loudly. “Dammit, we’re never getting out of here.”
“Shut up,” she whisper-hissed at her coworker before plastering on acustomer service face. “That’s great. I’ll call the store and see if the item is being brought over by other white-glove employees. If not, we’re happy to put it together for you, Mister Rivers.”
She moved past us, presumably heading to their delivery van with all the discards. When the guy didn’t follow, she paused and turned around. “Stu, come on!”
The guy startled, glaring at the girl before seeming to realize where he was. He gave us a sheepish smile before following his coworker quickly.
“Jesus,” Cat muttered before bringing her tablet to life. Had it been tucked under her arm this entire time? The thing seemed glued to her some days. “Purifier invoice. Final wardrobe amount pending. Paradise Pets again,” she spoke under her breath, jotting notes. “At this rate, you might as well build the cat its own wing.”
“If that’s what Tessa wants,” Tray said automatically, his voice doing that once-in-a-blue-moon serious lilt. “that’s what we’ll do.”
“We actually don’t know what Tessa wants at this point,” I remarked. “She could get here and absolutely hate cat trees.”
Tray wilted. “Shit, you think?”
“He’s messing with you, Tray.” Ryder comforted, though he looked on the verge of laughing again. “She’s going to love everything. And if not, we’ll give her anything else she wants.”
Itchy all over. Whole body discomfort. My skin felt tight. My head started to swim, and not from the medicine I’d just taken. I wanted to avoid more money talk, but Ryder had just opened that window again. As predicted, Cat jumped at the opportunity.
“Then you guys better get that new song finished.” Our hardworking publicist and ‘accidental’ personal assistant locked eyes with Tray first, me second, Ryder third, and then her gaze drifted over to Dixon who was sitting on the edge of the pool again. “Seriously. When I say you need a money-making hit, I meant you needed it yesterday.”
I shuffled my feet. Tray patted his thighs rhythmically. Ryder cleared his throat.
“Okay, I won't say any more on the subject for now. The most important thing is prepping for Tessa. Just keep in mind that if you want to give her the world, like you all say, then the world needs Oblivion Haze to rock the charts again.”
31
RYDER
LOS ANGELES…
I stoodacross from our PR manager, stewing on her words while relentlessly imagining a future where the coffers ran dry, the music truly went to shit, and we lost...everything. That kind of pressure was never good for stimulating fucking artistic inspiration.
Oblivion Haze needs to rock the charts.Cat always made it sound easy. Sure, we weren’t fucking brain surgeons, but writing a good song took scalpel-precision. We had to know where to slice, where to insert notes. What notes. How long we should hold the note. A half note, or a quarter note. Fuck, a whole note. The lyrics had to weave with the music or override it when necessary. Was it a string of words that should be screamed or whispered? Both could be impactful depending on what we wanted to communicate to our fans. The song I’d tried to write recently, the one that wrapped everything I’d felt since the Seattle concert into one shoddily wrapped package, could be our next ticket.
“You really don’t need to worry, CeeCee,” Tray finally broke the awkward quiet. “Our jam session maybe sounded like shit the other day, but the new song is solid. What was the title we finally settled on?” He looked around at us, his puppy dog eyes willing someone to help him convince Cat we weren’t a lost cause.
“‘Sinner’s Kiss’,” I pushed out, feeling broken for the millionth time.
“Yeah, “Sinner’s Kiss”. It’s a killer title.” Tray moved between me and Mac, clapping us both on the shoulders. “Absolutely nada to freak over, CeeCee. Oblivion Haze isn’t washed-up yet. Not by a long shot.”
“Right, not by a long shot,” I agreed halfheartedly, trying not to sink low.
An email pinged through on Cat’s tablet, thankfully yanking me from spiraling into complete depression. I watched as her expression lifted when she opened the new message. “Shipment update,” she breathed out. “The plane should be in the air soon.”
“How long’s the flight?” I felt on edge, nerves frayed. The anticipation was both breaking me and healing something that had been busted for a long fucking time.
“A little under three hours,” Catalina checked the previous email with the travel itinerary. “They’ll land in LAX, transfer to Eros product agents based here, and head over.”
