Fangirl (12 page)

“Yeah, Dr. Kyle. The doctor of dysfunction.”

“Hey, as long as I don't have to get fat and bald, I'm in. We could move to Hollywood and live the high life.”

Josie liked that her dad was a dreamer, and that he still had the spirit of a kid who thought that life could be a fairy tale, that he could someday win the lottery, move to Hollywood, and live happily ever after.

Puffy white bunnies and princess tales

Maidens and moons and that cute little mouse, goodnight to all

Scraping whiskers on my cheek

All grown now, no more mouse

Backyard talks on the porch of the house

I still love you

“How about we hear some piano?” her dad said as they finished up their dinner.

“Sounds good to me.” Josie finished her veggie burger and stacked her dad's empty plate onto hers. After dumping them in the garbage can next to the house, Josie used the moment to sneak a peek at her phone.

It vibrated back to life in her hand, illuminating her face in the twilight. A Twitter direct message alert popped up. She opened it.

@PeterMaxxNow
hi
@MusicLuvr
. Write any good songs lately?

Immediately after
he pressed Send, Peter feared the worst-case fangirl scenarios that his publicist and Bobby were always warning him about.

What if “
@MusicLuvr
” was a stalker? What if she was the kind of girl to tell the world that a famous guy just messaged her? What if she had a protective psycho father who read all her messages and would freak out on him? He didn't even know how old she was. Fourteen? Fifteen? Maybe she was only thirteen and looked old for her age. If Peter weren't so honest, he could always deny he sent the message, do what other celebrities do and have Abby put out a statement claiming he was hacked or something. But Peter never wanted to lie to his fans.

Breathe.

Realizing he was running late for dinner, Peter slipped on his high-tops and a Windbreaker and hustled down to the lobby to meet up with his entourage: Bobby; Abby; the five G Girls; his tour manager, Scout; Denny the sound guy; Phil the lighting guy; and Big Jim.

“We were just about to leave without you!” Bobby exclaimed when Peter appeared at the valet stand. “Mister Woo's Kitchen awaits. . . . Where's your phone?”

“In my room, duh.”

“Thatta boy.”

Bobby had a rule for group dinners: they were always “unplugged” get-togethers. Bobby had a theory that people nowadays didn't talk and get to know each other enough. They were constantly distracted by their phones, texting other people instead of actually interacting with those around them. “When I was young we would sit on the porch and jabber all night,” he said. As a result, his Chinese-food feast wasn't just about eating delicious food, but also about everyone connecting.

Bobby had arranged for the entire table of twelve to ride a vintage red cable car down California Street into Chinatown. When the rickety car creaked to a stop in front of the hotel and the conductor rang the bell, the entourage excitedly hopped aboard. The same two paparazzi guys from the Oakland Airport earlier in the day snapped away from across the street. Peter's freshly minted ex-girlfriend plopped beside him on the riding bench. Sandy leaned in and whispered, “Well, we might as well make it look good in public.”

“Good idea,” Peter agreed.

“Have you told anyone we broke up? 'Cuz I haven't.”

“Just Big Jim. And only because he was standing there the whole time and heard it anyway.”

“Well, you can fire his ass if he told anyone. Right?”

“Technically yes. But I'd never have to do that. Jimbo's solid.”

“I didn't mean it that way,” Sandy apologized.

“I know,” Peter said. Before, he would have been annoyed by her trash-talking Jim, would have taken it personally. Now that they had broken up, he just felt sad for her.

Peter's body was sitting in the cable car, his eyes watching the tourists on the sidewalks, his mouth moving as he talked to Sandy, but his mind was still back on what he had just done in his hotel room. It represented more to him than just an online flirtation. He felt like he had started a new chapter and, for the first time in a while, he was excited to explore something new with somebody new. Of course, he would never tell Sandy this, so he just chitchatted her with an emotional distance he might have with a stranger on a bus.

“How do you feel?” he asked.

“Great,” Sandy answered. “I'm already getting used to this friends thing. Seriously.”

“Good.” Peter nodded and smiled, patting her on the thigh in that unaffectionate, friend-to-friend way. “Glad we're on the same page. Now let's eat.”

Dumplings. Green tea. Wonton soup. Sweet-and-sour chicken. Chow mein. Szechuan chicken. Moo Shu pork. The table was covered in steaming plates and bowls, a feast fit for a king, or at least a pop star. Other diners couldn't help but notice the famous singer sitting at the large table in the back of the crowded restaurant. Peter was used to the attention. He had learned to block it out. He imagined that's what gorillas did at the zoo. They just came to accept that some random
stranger was always looking at them, even as they ate, slept and scratched their privates. Being a celebrity wasn't too different than being a zoo creature, but the pay was better—as was the food.

“Excuse me, mister. You the famous singer?” the tuxedoed server asked Peter.

“Yes.”

“My niece loves you. Take picture?”

Abby sprinted over to Peter's chair. “I'm sorry, sir,” she said abruptly. “We'd rather Peter be left alone while he eats. Thank you.”

“So sorry. So sorry.” The waiter nodded and shuffled backward.

Peter felt bad for the guy.

“It's cool, Abby,” he said. “The guy just wants a picture for his niece. It's okay.”

Abby bent over Peter's ear. “Look around you. There are fifty people in this place who want to do the same thing. If you do it for one, then you'll have to do it for everyone, and you won't be able to get out of here alive, let alone eat your dinner.”

By now, the ashamed waiter had disappeared back into the kitchen. What Abby said made sense, but it also didn't seem right.

The rest of the dinner party was eating and laughing at Bobby's clumsy use of chopsticks. They didn't notice. But Big Jim did. From across the table, he caught Peter's attention with
a lift of his chin and pointed to the kitchen with his right thumb over his shoulder and they both got up and walked away from the table. The two met up in front of the swinging doors separating the kitchen from the dining room, and Big Jim led Peter back into the pungent kitchen and approached the waiter, who was scooping soup into bowls. The waiter winced at the sight of the security guard towering over him.

“Sir, you still want that picture?” Big Jim said.

“Uh, I did, sir, yes.” The waiter excitedly handed Jim the camera.

Peter sidled beside the friendly man and rested his left arm around the waiter's shoulders, and Jim snapped away.

“Thank you, Thank you so very much.” The man glowed.

“No worries,” Peter told him as he patted him on the back. “What's your niece's name?”

“Anna,” he said. “She's fourteen. She real big fan. Big fan.”

“Well, tell her I said ‘hi' for me.”

As Peter made his way back to his table and finished his Asian feast, his mind still came back not to the millions of fans, but back to one. That girl in Bakersfield. If he had his phone, he would have been obsessively checking to see if she replied.

Instead, Peter sat in his chair sucking down noodles and laughing at the jokes his dad told about everyone at their own expense. Five years ago, Bobby would have been downing beers as he held court, and probably would have been a lot louder and a lot more obnoxious. But when Peter signed his record deal, Bobby vowed he'd go dry—and he did. “Life gives
you second chances,” he told his son the day he dumped his last case of beer down the kitchen drain. “Never third chances.”

Peter stared at the saucy noodles on his plate. He studied how some stuck together, intertwined around another, while others just lay alone, unable to connect to others. He didn't want to be a lone noodle.

As he pondered his plate wisdom, his mind went back to that crowded classroom in Bakersfield, back to eye-connecting with a girl who emanated innocence and purity and integrity. A girl whom he was feeling stuck on. The gawky girl with the sweet brown eyes and a ponytail that dropped perfectly between her shoulder blades. The girl whose T-shirt declared that music was her boyfriend. She wasn't Hollywood beautiful, but she was normal beautiful. Looking at pictures of his mom, Peter often noticed she had a similar kind of beauty. The kind that didn't need a three-hundred-dollar haircut and team of beauty handlers to create.

It was becoming clear to Peter that he had a crush—on a fangirl.

Meanwhile, on the opposite side of the table Sandy and her other G Girls gossiped about God-knows-what as they pretended to eat baby-size pieces of food. From the outside looking in, the scene might have looked like good food, friends, even family. But Peter couldn't enjoy the moment, because he couldn't get that girl out of his mind. He wanted her there with him.

The waiter returned to the table with the check, along with a plate stacked with plastic-wrapped fortune cookies. Peter had a tradition whenever he went to a Chinese restaurant: he would pass the plate of cookies around and make each person pick one, with him going last. It didn't matter what others picked or that he may have missed out on one if he picked earlier. The breathing-based meditation therapy he had been doing recently had taught him that the most important thing in life was to be present. God takes care of everything else. Indeed, he believed in fate, even when it came to reading cheesy fortune cookies.

Peter got up and walked around the circular table, and each of the diners chose a treat. The last to select was Sandy and, as it turned out, she took the last cookie. “Looks like you have no fortune.” Sandy giggled. Her expression turned bitter. So did her tone. “How ironic,” she said smugly.

The waiter stepped to the table and handed Peter a cookie. “Where I'm from,” he said, “last is lucky.” Peter nodded in agreement.

“Okay,” Peter announced to the group. “Clockwise. You go first, Jimmy.”

Big Jim split open his cookie with his giant hands as if opening a tiny book and pulled a slip of paper from the crumbled mess. “Like a closed mouth gathers no food, a closed mind gathers no wisdom.” The table exploded in laughter. “Amen!” he said, dropping the treat in his mouth.

As they went around the table there were the typical ones
(“Happiness is a state of mind” for Bobby) and the generic (“You will live a long and happy life” for Abby). Then it came to Sandy. She cracked open hers, careful not to chip her bright-red fingernail polish. “Beauty is more than skin deep,” she read aloud to the group.

Everyone at the table had heard her, but no one offered up a reaction. “How ironic,” Peter quipped. The table nervously laughed—all but for Sandy.

“Ha-ha,” she sneered.

Peter bit off an end of the cookie, slowly plucked out the thin strip of paper, and cleared his throat with dramatic flair. He flashed a smile. “Trust your heart.”

“Cheers to that!” Bobby announced as he lifted his glass of water.

Peter folded the message and slid it into his jeans pocket.

Back at the hotel shortly before midnight, Peter high-fived and bro-hugged his crew goodnight before they went up the elevator to their rooms. Everyone, that is, but Sandy. She was MIA.

“Where's Sandy?” Peter asked Molly, the other petite blond G Girl.

“She already went upstairs. She said something about some stuff she had to do.”

So did Peter. Once inside his hotel room, Peter shot a beeline straight for his phone. He powered it on, but the screen stayed black. Oh, crap. He forgot to charge the battery. He grabbed his laptop off the bed, plopped down on the sitting-
area couch, and flipped open his laptop. He was too tired to look at all his
@replies
. Tonight, he only cared about reading one fan:
@MusicLuvr
. But there, at the top where the newest messages were displayed, was nothing. Not a single reply.

A lonely noodle, indeed.

Josie remembered
reading the Tweet from Peter and her heart skipping a beat. Gasping for air. Blinking to make sure she was reading what her eyes told her she was reading, that it was real. That she was someone who mattered enough for him to write to her.

She felt special—with a future as bright as the slanting colors of orange angling across the flat farmland. But then the next events played in her mind like a movie that she had memorized line by line, shot by shot, a movie in which she was just another character in the unfolding drama, someone caught up in a moment of which she had no control.