Bad Girls (29 page)

Amber turned, bolting for the door. I’m such an idiot! she scolded herself. What was I thinking?

And then she admitted as she fumbled with the door handle: I wasn’t thinking anything. I just wanted to touch him.

She was frantic to get out, to escape from her own humiliation. But right on the other side of the door was the girl from the therapy session a few days ago, the sulky one with the bright yellow bob. Petal, she was called.

‘God! Finally! I’ve been waiting, like,
hours
,’ Petal spat at her crossly. ‘My appointment was
ages
ago!’

Petal’s eyes were outlined heavily with black pencil; combined with the daffodil-tinted hair and her dead-white skin, it made her look like a Gothic doll. The resemblance was heightened by her ripped black leggings and stripy T-shirt.

‘I’m sorry,’ Amber said.

‘You just hogged Dr Raf for
ages
! That’s totally unfair! And selfish!’ Petal complained angrily.

‘Petal!’ Dr Raf came up behind Amber. ‘I’m so sorry to keep you waiting . . .’

Petal gazed up at him with big, adoring eyes.

‘It’s OK,’ she said, her voice breathy now. ‘I know it’s not
your
fault.’

And, pushing past Amber, Petal swanned into Dr Raf’s office, slamming the door shut behind her so sharply that Amber had to jump out of the way to avoid being hit by it.

Back in their shared room, Skye was curled up on her bed. She was wearing a dressing gown, her hair was pulled up into a high ponytail and her face was bare of makeup; she looked fresh from the shower. Headphones were plugged into her ears, and a notebook was open on her lap. Amber had to stand in front of her, waving, before Skye realized that there was someone else in the room.

‘Oh, hey,’ she said, pulling out the earbuds, R&B flooding through them before she found her MP3 player and turned it off. ‘Feeling better?’

‘They say I’m over the worst of it,’ Amber said, sitting down on her own bed. ‘I hope so, anyway.’

Skye grimaced. ‘Can’t have been much fun,’ she said sympathetically. ‘So, they moving you back into our room now?’

‘Yes – I just saw Dr Raf,’ Amber said, so infatuated that she got a little thrill each time she pronounced his name. ‘He said I was doing better.’

‘Ooh, Dr Raf!’ Skye grinned. ‘It was awesome when he carried you out of group. Dr Lucy was shooting daggers at you. And Petal was drooling in jealousy. I’m amazed she hasn’t pulled a faint herself.’

‘Oh God, Petal . . .’ Amber pulled a face. ‘She just yelled at me because my session with Dr Raf ran over. She
really
doesn’t like me.’

‘Well, what do you expect?’ Skye said, laughing. ‘First you do a romance-cover faint, and then you postpone her Dr Raf fix! It’s the only thing she lives for at the moment! She follows him around like a little puppy! Have you
seen
the way she looks at him?’

Amber nodded.

‘
Major
daddy issues,’ Skye said gnomically. ‘Believe me. I mean, her dad’s
Gold
. Everyone in the world’s got a crush on him, and from what she says, she’s barely ever been alone with him. That’s got to fuck you up.’

Amber pulled a pillow off her bed and curled up with it in her lap, hugging it. Skye was already making her feel a lot better about the Petal confrontation.

‘Just stay out of her way,’ Skye advised. ‘She’s like an open wound right now.’

‘OK,’ Amber said. ‘Thanks.’

‘Any time.’ Skye sighed, looking down at her notebook. ‘Dr Lucy told me to try some free association, but I’m totally sucking at it. You know? You write down whatever comes into your head? I’m so bored I actually gave it a shot, and all I’ve done for, like, an
hour
, is write, “La la la Get me out of here” over and over again. Look.’ She held up her open notebook so Amber could see.

Amber couldn’t help cracking a smile. ‘You seem – I don’t know –
normal
,’ she said before she could think it over. ‘I mean, you seem like a – a happy person. Not like me and Petal.’ She reflected. ‘Or those other guys in group. Not Joe. You’re like Joe – you both seem . . . happy.’ She felt very inarticulate. ‘I suppose I’m saying that I’m really fucked up. And I can see that most of the other people here are. But you don’t seem fucked up. At all.’

‘Interesting,’ Skye said, looking at Amber hard. ‘Dr Lucy thinks what she calls my “cheerful façade” is just a cover-up for all kinds of deep-buried crap.’

‘But it isn’t, is it?’ Amber said, without knowing why.

‘Ha!’ Skye burst out laughing. She leaned over, holding her palm out flat to Amber, who took a moment to realize she was supposed to high-five the other girl. ‘No, it isn’t! You’re smarter than Dr Lucy! And you know what?’ She snapped shut the notebook and dropped it onto the floor. ‘You’re right about Joe too.’ She grinned saucily. ‘There’s nothing wrong with that man either.’

‘So why are you here?’

Skye shrugged, looking away.

‘I told everyone in group, remember? This sugar daddy of mine made me come here. I go through rehab for “sex addiction” –’ she raised her acrylic-tipped fingers and made the quotation mark sign with them – ‘and he sets me up in a nice little love nest.’ She grimaced again. ‘I’m not really that talented a dancer, you know? All the girls at the Lounge, they want to be Diamond. That’s their dream.’

Seeing Amber’s blank face, she elaborated: ‘The burlesque dancer who wears real diamonds in her costume? She’s got her own show in Vegas now? And she does those vodka ads on the TV? But she’s really
good.
I mean, she’s a
star
. No way am I that good a dancer. I get by with this and these.’ She pointed to her pretty face, her high firm breasts. ‘That’s all I’ve got. Snagging a sugar daddy, having someone buy me an apartment, put it in my name . . . Look, I’m not saying I’m any kind of role model, but this is the hand I got dealt, and I’m playing it out.’

Skye’s head was tilted now as she looked at Amber, a challenge in her eyes; she was daring Amber to judge her.

‘I mean, you’re, like, a
supermodel
,’ she continued. ‘There are tons of girls who look like me.’

‘No.’ Amber was shaking her head vehemently. ‘I’m nothing like a supermodel. And I’m over the hill now, anyway. Twenty-seven’s like
sixty
in model years, believe me. I’m only here because someone’s paying for me, too,’ Amber found herself confessing. ‘A sort of sugar daddy.’

‘Really?’ Skye’s eyebrows arched.

‘I met him through modelling,’ Amber said, trying to stick as close to the truth as she dared.‘For him it’s all about how I look. He has no idea who I am.’ She paused. ‘Which isn’t really his fault,’ she added to her own surprise.‘Because I have no idea who I am either.’

‘Oh,
honey
. . .’ Skye slid off her bed and onto Amber’s, sitting next to her, taking her hands and squeezing them. ‘I’ve met a
lot
of girls, believe me,’ Skye said drily. ‘You don’t do the job I do without getting real good at sizing girls up. And whoever you are, you seem pretty nice to me.’

Amber thought she was about to cry. And then, to her great surprise and even greater pleasure, she realized that she was smiling back at Skye instead.

‘Come on,’ Skye said, pulling Amber to her feet. ‘Let’s go out in the garden and catch some rays.’

Pulling on a T-shirt and cut-offs, Skye led the way to the garden. She paused just as the two girls crossed the threshold out onto the patio, taking in the scene: the air outside was rich and warm after the air-conditioned facility. Purple bougainvillaea trailed down the wall behind the fountain, and the palm trees on the patio area were a canopy of leaves, sunlight dappling through them onto the flagstones.

Brian was sitting by the fountain, trailing his hand in the water, looking glum. And, lying on his favourite lounger on the lawn, rich cigar smoke rising into the air above him, was Joe Jeffreys, all six foot two inches of him, his Hawaiian shirt unbuttoned to show off his rock-hard, golden-tanned, rippling abs. Sunlight glinted on the belt buckle that fastened his faded old blue jeans. He looked like the Marlboro Man; all he needed was a cowboy hat to complete the picture.

Glancing over, he caught sight of Amber and Skye, and a huge smile spread over his handsome face, his blue eyes sparkling with enthusiasm. He lifted the hand holding the cigar and gestured at the girls to come over and join him.

Skye hesitated for a moment.

Joe called: ‘Hey, Amber! Nice to see you up and about!’

Skye said swiftly to Amber: ‘We’re friends, right? You and me?’

Amber looked at Skye, confused. Skye was staring up at Amber with something very close to entreaty in her big blue eyes.

I barely know her, Amber thought, taken aback. But she’s been really nice to me. And I need friends. I
really
need girlfriends.

‘Um, yes,’ Amber answered cautiously.

‘So would you do me a huge favour?’ Skye entreated. ‘Would you dial it down with Joe?’

‘I don’t understand . . .’

‘He has this whole wounded-bird fantasy going on about you. And I don’t want him to get distracted from me.’ Skye’s voice was lowered. ‘This could be my ticket out of everything, you know? Plus,’ she jerked her head over at Joe, ‘honestly, I don’t think you’re up to sneaking around with one of the most famous guys on the planet, behind the back of one of the most famous women on the planet. You’ve got yourself to take care of, and that’s a full-time job at the moment.’

Amber couldn’t help smiling. Skye was smart enough to put her case very well, and she was absolutely right.
The last thing I need is to be splashed all over the tabloids, or have paparazzi after me. Skye was tactful enough not to say it, but I’d relapse in two seconds with all that stress.

She nodded, acknowledging the truth of Skye’s words. ‘And you think you can handle it?’ she asked, her green eyes serious.

‘Just watch me!’ Skye said immediately. She took a breath, fiddling with her ponytail. ‘I don’t want you to think I’m a
total
slut,’ she added. ‘Jennifer – his fiancée – she’s gay. It’s all for publicity. I mean, he’s got to get it
somewhere
.’ She fixed Amber with a firm stare. ‘I’ve got your back here. Whatever you need, you can count on me. You get sick again, I’ll take care of you. And you leave Joe to me, OK?’

‘All right,’ Amber agreed, as Joe called: ‘Ladies! Aren’t you gonna come keep me company?’

‘Well, since you’re asking so nicely . . .’ Skye called back, flashing her very best smile as she and Amber crossed the lawn to join him.

P
etal couldn’t ever remember feeling so lonely in her life.

She was sitting in the lounge, by the only phone they were allowed at Cascabel, apart from two hours on Sunday night when they got their cellphones back if their doctors thought they could be trusted with them. The lounge phone was so old-fashioned it was actually on a cord; you couldn’t pick it up and take it into your room for a private conversation. So Petal was having to wait there, sprawled on the sofa, looking like an idiot, waiting for her boyfriend to ring her, because the phone didn’t make outgoing calls, and after lots of sobbing and begging and pleading with Dr Raf, she’d negotiated a precious, scheduled call from Dan.

Only she’d been waiting forty minutes, and the call still hadn’t come. Petal was pretty much ready to tear her face off with her fingernails.

The worst part was that a tech was hovering round, doing something meaningless in the office next door, but really there to listen in on Petal’s call and make sure she didn’t do something that Cascabel would term ‘inappropriate’. Like asking Dan to fly over here and score her an eight-ball of coke on the way.

Ohmigod!

The phone was actually ringing! Petal sat up straight, afraid that she was hallucinating the sound because she wanted to hear it so much. She snatched it out of its cradle almost before the first ring had finished. Petal had never been any good at delayed anticipation.

‘Dan?’ she gasped into the receiver.

‘Pet! Hey, I can’t believe we finally get to talk! How are you?’

‘
Shit
,’ she said fervently, wrapping the cord around her wrist. ‘Total, utter, fucking
shit.
It’s horrible here. I hate it.’

‘Well, we never thought it was going to be fun, did we?’ Dan said sensibly. ‘You’re nearly halfway through, though.’

‘That’s easy for you to say,’ Petal grumbled. ‘You’re not here. Why’re you so late ringing me, anyway? I’ve been waiting
hours
!’

‘We’re recording, pet,’ he said proudly. ‘Wrote a song for the
Breaking Down
soundtrack, can you believe it? And looks like they’re going to do a video! Us and some sexy vampires! Amazing, eh? We’re so made up about it I can’t tell you!’

‘Sounds brilliant,’ Petal said, her words dripping with acid. ‘I’m so glad you’re having a fantastic time without me.’

‘Aw, pet, don’t be like this! I miss you – you’re my girl! But I thought you’d be pleased! This is the big time for us, yeah?’

‘I waited
hours
for you to ring me,’ Petal complained, tears rising to her eyes. ‘You don’t know what it’s
like
here, Dan. It’s like
prison.
I can’t do anything I want. Everyone’s horrible to me. And you couldn’t even
ring
me when you said you were going to . . .’

‘Pet, be reasonable,’ he pleaded. ‘I can’t just down tools and walk out halfway through a bloody song, can I, now? I shot out as soon as I could. You want me to put one of the lads on to tell you it’s true?’

‘You’ve probably got tons of groupies hanging out in front of the studio right now, don’t you?’ Petal was digging her own grave. ‘Where are you – Air?’

‘Yeah, as a matter of fact.’

Petal pictured the big studios, a sprawling, red-brick Victorian converted church on Haverstock Hill in Hampstead; she’d practically lived there when her father or his friends were recording albums. She and Tas had loved hanging out there, wandering around the other studios, being alternately petted and hit on by other musicians and producers, treated as mascots by the recording staff; the best part of all was waltzing in and out at will, past the schoolgirls and groupies and hardcore fans camped out in the parking lot, sitting forlornly on the walls, waiting patiently for their idols to emerge, casting spiteful, jealous stares at Petal and Tas with their access-all-areas passes.