Here I Go Again: A Novel (17 page)

Deva:
ptarmigan

Deva:
parentheses

Deva:
NO!! HATE AUTOMOBILE!

Me:
???

Deva:
argh! parents. how are yon parents, lucy rye bread?

Me:
had dinner with yon parents on tuesday—r fine

That’s the truth. They’re fine. My mom naturally commandeered most of the conversation, so, business as usual. I didn’t love instantly seeing twenty-one additional years on their faces, although Daddy’s showing his age a lot more than Mamma. He’s still doing crazy hours at the firm, but I guess he’s kind of a workaholic. Nothing new there.

Deva:
oaky, just checkout

Deva:
checker

Deva:
check in mail

Deva:
dam! checking!

Me:
new client coming in 5, gtg—talk when u get back

Deva:
cunt

Me:
i’m sorry?

Deva:
oh, deer, no! NO! c u later, lacy romper! argh! hate autocorrect!!

Me:
take care and say hey to the mayans for me

I turn off my phone and pull up the meeting brief one of my assistants prepared. (Assistants! Plural!) We’re trying to woo a new pop sensation away from our competitors and today’s our first sit-down.

According to my notes—did I mention that Future Lissy—I mean, Melissa—has been working on a memoir?—“I normally approach a new client interaction by really staying quiet. I let them do all the talking. I find in so doing, they’ll tell me exactly what’s most important to them and I can build my strategy around their wants and needs.” Wow, how smart was my future parallel-universe self?

According to the brief, this kid we’re pitching, known to her legion of fans as ChaCha, became an overnight sensation due to some YouTube videos. Unfortunately, I’ve not watched any of them yet. My stupid computer’s making me batty—every time I try to access streaming media, I buffer and never load. Seriously, I can slip through a wormhole in the cosmos with no issue, but can I access a video of a bear bouncing off a trampoline? Negatory. Fortunately, there’s an IT guy coming to take a look at my laptop later today.

I glance at ChaCha’s CD cover. Hmm. The photo caught her in motion, so her features aren’t real clear, but she looks thirty with all the hair and makeup. She seems familiar, but that’s likely because this little girl is what would happen if Britney and Ke$ha had a baby, sprayed her with glitter, and sent her to work the main stage.

But her songs are incredibly popular, even though they’re so bubblegum/electropop that they make me want to stab myself in the ear with a letter opener. Is she talented? No clue. Couldn’t tell you what her actual voice sounds like, because her tracks have been Auto-Tuned to death. The bulk of her audience is between eight and fifteen years old, and every time ChaCha goes to a shopping mall, riots ensue. And yet David Coverdale can hit Whole Foods in Lake Tahoe and be completely unnoticed, at least according to his recent Christmas card. That seems so wrong.

Regardless, ChaCha’s first single, “Fruck You,” has been one of iTune’s most downloaded songs in history, and her follow-up, “No Frucking Way,” from the new
Motherfrucker
album, is on a similar trajectory. I wonder what Brian’s take would be on her music? Would he be all, “Give her some pants, slap a guitar in her hand, and she’s a baby Janis Joplin,” or more like, “So
that’s
what three cats in a blender sounds like.”

My first assistant, Mandy, intercoms me. “Melissa? They’re here. Everyone’s in the south conference room when you’re ready. I put out coffee, soda, juice, tea, Red Bull, fruit, and assorted pastries, so they should be in fine shape if you need a second.”

“Great, thanks!” I reply. I find now that I actually have responsibility, I’ve risen to the occasion. Honestly, it’s not like I didn’t know a lot of this stuff in my previous-future. PR’s not exactly brain surgery. (No offense.) If you’ve amassed decent media contacts, if you can compose a sentence, if you’re not afraid of using exclamation points, and if you possess the ability to bullshit/talk your way out of trouble/occasionally deny everything despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, you’re three-quarters of the way to success. Throw in motivation, determination, and a continental breakfast? Boom! Done.

I grab a notebook and a pen and stride down the hallway. I catch a glimpse of myself on the glass wall in front of the conference room. I come across as confident and happy, and the clothes and hair lend a certain gravitas that I’ve never had before. Clearly these aren’t the sartorial choices I’d have made in my previous-future, but they sure seem to be working in this case.

I spy ChaCha and her team before they see me. Their backs are to the glass wall and they’re all hovering around the buffet. I’m guessing the one in the fishnet top, shorty-shorts, and army boots who’s scooping cream cheese out of the Danish center and sucking it off her fingers is ChaCha. Charming.

I peg the guys in the shiny suits as her manager, agent, and attorney, and smart money says the mountain of a man in the untucked oxford with the shaved head is her security detail. The two trashy women (not judgey if it’s true) are likely her hair and makeup people, and the guy in khakis who’s standing really stiffly is her dad. I wonder if I’m used to teenagers with entourages in my new future.

I open the door and announce, “Hello! Welcome! I’m Melissa Connor of Melissa Connor Public Relations! Thanks so much for being here. I’m really looking forward to finding out what we can do for you.”

Everyone turns around, including ChaCha.

Who, under all the makeup and truck stop waitress uniform, is actually
Charlotte
.

What the fruck?

CHAPTER TEN

Ripples

My thoughts immediately begin racing. Why is Charlotte here? When did she become a pop star? Why didn’t anyone tell me? And does Nicole know her stepkid owns such obscene shorts?

The first person to speak is Bobby. He steps forward and extends a hand. “Ms. Connor, hello. I’m Bobby Paulson, Charlotte’s father, and we’d—”

“My name is
ChaCha
, all right? ChaCha,” Charlotte spits. “Get it right,
Bobby
.” Then she digs out a crystal-studded iPhone I’ve never seen and begins to furiously text with her smudgy digits while Bobby shrugs sheepishly.

Um . . . why are they acting like I’m a stranger? Duke and I have spent every Thanksgiving with them for the past six years. We went to Puerto Rico together and New Orleans, and I’ve been to his little cabin in Wisconsin a dozen times. Maybe I don’t see him all the time, but I talk to his wife every day. I was maid of honor at his wedding. I was there when his babies were born.

Okay, I wasn’t
there
, per se, but I sent lovely gift baskets.

Or I meant to, anyway. Thoughts count.

Regardless, my hair’s not so different, and I’m not that much thinner than I was before my postbreakup breakdown over the summer, so why is there zero flash of recognition? “Bobby, it’s Lissy.”

“Have we met before?” he asks politely.

“What’s a
Lissy
?” Charlotte demands. “What, is that like a combination of ‘lick’ and ‘pussy’? Ha! Seraphina, did you hear what I said? That means this bitch eats at the Y! Ha! Haa!” The one with the Bettie Page neck tattoo, presumably Seraphina, nods in appreciation at ChaCha’s scathing wit. Charlotte responds with a profoundly vivid fingers-and-mouth gesture.

Oh,
hell
, no.

According to Nicole, Bobby’s never been a disciplinarian, so I’m not surprised at this heinous brat’s behavior in his presence. Actually, Nicole’s parenting style is a tad indulgent for my taste, too, because when did it become okay for children to be seen
and
heard? Still, Nicole has some standards and clearly this teenage terrorist is violating all of them. The earth would open up and swallow Nicole whole before she allowed this kind of chatter from a kid . . . even if said kid can sell out Madison Square Garden.

My mission is clear.

“I’m so sorry—I just realized there’s someone missing. Please excuse me while I grab her. Have some more coffee. Perhaps you’d like to disembowel another Danish, ChaCha?” I flash an icy grin before I spin on my heel and dash down the hallway to Nicole’s office. I drag her back to the conference room and hustle her through the door. I’m not even going to tell her what’s going on. I’m just going to let her witness it so she can fix it. Maybe getting a good old ass-whoopin’ in front of her attorney is just what this junior Girl Gone Wild needs.

Undaunted, Nicole steps forward and offers her hand. “Hi, there. I’m Nicole Golden. Pleasure to meet you. Melissa asked me to sit in on the meeting, if you don’t mind.”

I’m desperately confused. What’s with the introductions? Why are they not hugging? Or laughing? How come the she-devil’s face didn’t light up like it always does when Nic walks in the room?

And, wait a hot minute, since when is she Nicole
Golden
? She’s been Nicole Paulson for more than six years, and this is her husband and booty-short-wearing, beating-needing, wicked stepdaughter. I glance at Nicole’s ring finger and notice she’s not wearing the big rock Bobby gave her three months after they met.

Slowly the pieces begin to come together. If Nicole’s been working here with me for eight years, then . . . that means she
didn’t
meet Bobby seven and a half years ago at a PTA event, so . . .

Holy guacamole!

If they never met, then they certainly didn’t get married. If they weren’t married, then they didn’t churn out enough sticky progeny to require the purchase of a minivan. I guess that’d explain why she hadn’t plastered her office with their photos. Shit! I thought she was just being professional by not yammering on about potty training and playdates and being all in my face with class pictures!

Unable to handle the gravity of the situation, I land in one of the conference room chairs with a thump. Everyone else follows suit.

As I’m too stunned to speak coherently, Nicole adroitly takes over and starts a round of introductions. Although I’ve not actually seen her in action this time around, I have a feeling that Nicole’s a better second than I am a first sometimes.

As we go around the room saying who we are and what we do, I learn I was right about everyone except the two women. Seraphina is Charlotte’s swagger coach.

(Note to self: Google “swagger coach.”)

(Suspect it has something to do with Bieber.)

(Fucking Bieber ruins everything.)

The other bimbo with all the purple hair extensions and a skirt the size of a hankie is named Tawny. She’s Charlotte’s
stepmother.

I suddenly hate everyone and everything.

More so than usual, I mean.

I guess it stands to reason that if Nicole and Bobby never met each other, he’s allowed to be with someone else, but, really,
her
?
What attracted him to this cut-rate Pamela Anderson? An uncanny ability to tweeze her brows into twin pencil-thin mustaches? A deep and abiding love of small swaths of unnatural fibers? Her exemplary parenting skills? Them together makes as much sense as when Tiger Woods banged that Waffle House waitress instead of his Swedish bikini-model wife. Opting for her over Nicole would be like considering ordering a filet and instead eating a Band-Aid off a public toilet.

As Team ChaCha discusses expectations and goals, I steal glances at the new Mrs. Bobby Paulson. Were I forced to describe this woman in one word, that word would be . . . herpes.

While Nicole expertly explains the way our company handles online campaign management, Tawny interrupts with a question. “How much you gonna pay ChaCha for this?”

ChaCha’s manager pokes the agent under the table and her attorney rolls his eyes, while the bodyguard makes a small moue of disgust. Gamely, Bobby volunteers, “This is a publicity firm, Tawny, baby. If we choose to work with them, we’d be paying them for their time and effort.”

Tawny snorts. “That don’t sound right. You should be giving us money if you want to be associated with my little ChaCha.”