Dia of the Dead (8 page)

“I can’t believe this news. Didn’t you just see her last night at BB’s party?” she asked.

“Yeah,” I said quietly.

“That poor child. That poor, poor child.” She shook her head.

“Dia.” 

I looked over my shoulder. Brendan Baker ran his hands through his hair, his blue eyes shiny with tears and the tip of his nose a bit red. I turned around to face him fully.

“A couple of us are going to Mason’s dressing room to hang out and remember Missy. Would you like to come?”

“Uh…” I turned back to mom and asked for permission without using words, only facial expressions.  From the looks I got from the other moms in the pack, I knew I looked ridiculous.

“You can g
o,
” Mom said.

I mouthed a “thank you” to her and turned back to Brendan, trying not to sport an ear-to-ear smile since it’d be in bad taste. 

“But I need to talk to you quickl
y,
” Mom added.

“Brendan, I’ll catch up with you guys in a bit. Apparently I have to talk to my mom first.” I sighed.

“Catch you later.” 

Brendan left and Mom said goodbye to the other momagers before scooting me off to the side to talk.

“What’s this all about?” I asked.

“Was that Benjamin?” Her voice was low, almost a whisper.

“Brendan. And yes, that’s him.”

“He’s cute.”

The grin I’d been fighting, finally made an appearance on my face. I couldn’t help it.

Mom’s face softened then hardened the next instant. “Be careful,” she warned.

“What?”

“Be carefu
l,
” she repeated and gave me a pat on the shoulder before turning to leave.

“Wait, Mom. What?” I called after her. 

“Just be careful. Call me when you’re ready for me to come pick you up.” She tilted her head, lowering her glasses to peer at me for a second before putting them back into place and disappeared through the exit doors while I headed off to find my friends.

Mason’s dressing room was located in building Six wher
e
Dia of the Dea
d
was filmed. It was right across the hall from mine. The door was open when I arrived but it was oddly quiet. No loud music spilled into the hallway and there was no sound of electronic explosions and gunfire from the video games he usually played during long breaks. I hesitated outside for a moment, afraid of seeing a room full of people crying but I pushed myself to enter.

Mason’s dressing room made mine seem like a broom closet in comparison. I kept the decorations in my space at Bixby Studios simple but that clearly wasn’t the case for Mason. His space was extremely personalized and if left to my imagination, I would’ve guessed his home was probably decorated in the same over the top manner. Everything in the room was scarlet, including the walls and furniture. It was almost like we stepped into a VIP lounge in Hell. A television was mounted to the wall on my left with a video game paused mid-play. Two gaming chairs were stationed in front of it with the black controllers resting in them, their cords stretched across a red rectangular rug. A number of small mirrors hung on the far wall. Framed photos of Mason doing different poses in varying degrees of shirtlessness hung alongside the mirrors. Looking at them, I wondered if Kaci realized she would never like Mason as much as Mason liked Mason.

I turned back toward the group and paused. My stomach lurched at the sight of Reagan Bixby. She was wedged between Brendan and the arm of Mason’s Satan sofa looking extremely uncomfortable. She had her arm linked in his while he had the other draped around the shoulders of a puffy-eyed Amber. The three of them sat close together while Mason sat on the other end.

“Hello, Di
a,
” Reagan said darkly, stroking the back of Brendan’s hand like it was a pet in the lap of a villainess. She looked absolutely ridiculous. I bit back a giggle at the creeped out expression on Brendan’s face. Reagan straightened in her seat, causing everyone to scoot down on the sofa.

Kaci and Taylor were on the rug near the sofa. An obviously frustrated Kaci fiddled with her phone, holding it up toward the ceiling and muttering curse words under her breath. Taylor looked to be in the same boat. She pecked on her phone’s screen like pressing harder would result in a clearer signal or something. The dressing rooms were on the lower level where cell phone reception was scarce.

My eyes fell back on Amber. She looked like death. She’d lost some color in her face and her swollen eyes were bagged with dark rings. The deep red stain was smaller than what I’d seen earlier. It seemed like she had changed the bandage but her wound hadn’t stopped bleeding. A rash of black and blue bruises that weren’t there before crept up her forearm toward her shoulder.

I started to ask how she felt but noticed Reagan glaring at me, still rubbing Brendan’s hand. He slipped it out of her grip and removed his arm from around Amber’s shoulder, settling his hands in his lap with a shudder.

“What are you doing here?” Reagan snipped.

“Um…I…” I stammered, trying to get out an answer.

“Brendan invited me,” she announced. Her eyes were trained on me as she said his name. She reached for his hand to continue being weird but he pulled farther away, flashing a look of warning in her direction. She pretended to stretch, playing off Brendan’s rejection.

“I invited Dia to
o,
” he spoke up.

The smug look on Reagan’s face disappeare
d,
and her signature scowl returned.

“What’s up, Dia-Dia?” Mason asked. His gre
eting didn’t match the sadness on his face.

“Brendan said that you all were gathering to remember Missy. I know you were close to he
r,
and I wanted to see if you were okay or if there was anything that I could do.” 

 
“We’re fine.” Reagan’s tone was razor sharp. “You can go now but thanks for asking.” 

“Dia’s just trying to be nic
e,
” Brendan said, inching to his left to put another millimeter of distance between himself and Reagan. 

She rolled her eyes.
 

“Welp!”
 Mason clapped his hands together loudly, startling everyone. “While I’d love to watch the cat fight that's been brewing between you two since the day you met,” he motioned from me to Reagan, “now’s not the time.”

He stood up. “Ladies, retract those claws and chillax. Instead of arguing, let’s take a few moments to remember our lost friend, Missy.”
 

He bowed his head.
 Everyone took a cue from him and did the same. Soft sniffles interrupted the room's silence. They grew louder, turning into muffled cries. I lifted my head. Amber had her face buried in her hands, bawling.

“Missy was my friend.”
 Her voice was thick with tears. “M
y
frien
d
.
 
I can’t believe she’s gone. I’m sorry, guys.” She sniffed. “For crying.” She dabbed at the corner of her eyes with a crumpled tissue.

“Hey, hey. There’s no need to apologize.”
 Brendan said softly, handing her another tissue from the box at his feet.  “We’re all feeling the same way. We saw her last night and she seemed perfectly fine.”

“My sister and I saw her early this morning while trying to salvage the rest of our night after she ruined the party. She seemed like a crazy druggie skank to me.”

“Jesus, Reagan! What is wrong with you?” Brendan snapped, his face reddening as he turned toward her.

“What?” Reagan shrugged.
 “I’m just being honest. Did you see her at my sister’s party? She was a mess.”

“That doesn’t give you the right to call her a ‘crazy druggie skank’,” Brendan snapped again.

“I can call Missy any kind of skank I want. If it weren’t for my father, Melissa Bolton would be just another dumb blonde roaming the streets of L.A. looking for work. The Bixbys made her a household name. Without us, she’d be nothing.”

Reagan sat there with a smug look that dared someone to challenge her.

Brendan’s face turned a brighter shade of red. He put his hands up in front of him for a moment then buried his face in them before dragging them through his hair and exhaling. He muttered something to himself then looked up, appearing calmer than he did a second ago.

Though he was obviously upset, he didn’t offer a counter argument. No one did. The Bixby name carried weight in Hollywood and Reagan was right. Without Bixby, we'd all be nobodies.

“That was really uncomfortable, and I think I’m even more bummed out than I was befor
e,
” Mason said somberly.

Amber’s soft cries fell silent. She nodded her head in agreement with Mason. Or what looked like agreement. It was hard to tell. Since Reagan’s rant about Missy, Amber had been kind of bobbing her head around like her neck couldn’t support the weight.
 The bruises had spread past her elbow and were joined by dark lines that snaked up her arm like vines.

“Amber, are you okay?”
 I asked.

“Maybe she’s on whatever Missy was on last night. Birds of a feather, you know,” Reagan muttered.

Mason jumped to his feet and moved toward me, filling the space between where I stood and where Reagan was sitting on the couch. His arms were outstretched as if to stop one of us from attacking the other.

“I think I have an idea of something we can do to make us all feel better.” He crossed the room, walking over to the counter in front of the wall-length mirror.
 He returned cradling a stack of magazines in his arms.

“Here.” He handed an issue to everyone.

“These are next month’s teen mags. What I’d like you all to do—if you would be so kind—is to flip through them, find any picture or poster of me and carefully rip it out. I’m looking to redecorate and I want to switch up the photographs in my gallery.” He pointed to the numerous pictures of him all around the room.

“Note I said ‘carefully.’ No rips, tears, or messed up edges.
 Also, keep in mind, they have to be good pictures. Nothing where I don't look hot. Though I don’t know how that would be possible since I’m me and it’s crazy for me not to be hot. But if you’re having difficulty assessing my hotness, please consult with me. Okay? Okay. Great. Now everyone get your magazines and start looking.” He opened the magazine he’d saved for himself and started his search.

“Wait. Wait. Wait.”
 I put my hands up. “You want us to clip out pictures of you for your wall?”

Mason lowered his magazine. “Yeah. Basically.”

“I’ll help yo
u,
Mas
e,
” Kaci said, taking the magazine he had given her. She folded her legs like it was story time in kindergarten and began flipping through pages.

“Thanks.” Mason winked at her, making her entire face light up.
 “The rest of you could take a few notes from my girl Kaci here.” 

She blushed and smiled at the magazine in her hands.

“Dude, I’m not about to look through this for pictures of yo
u,
” Brendan said. 

“You can toss it her
e,
” Kaci offered. Brendan threw it over to her.

“Hey, Man! Careful.”
 Mason picked up the discarded magazine from the floor, smoothing its pages back into place. He held it like it was fragile to the touch and carefully placed it in front of Kaci. I'd never seen her smile as wide as she did when Mason patted the top of her head on the way back to his seat with his magazine.  

Mason’s attempt at a diversion worked.
 While Reagan still gave me the stink eye, no one talked much. I took a seat on the floor next to Kaci, not that I was going to spend any time looking through the magazine in my hand for Mason, but I didn’t know what else to do.

I set the magazine aside, reached into my ba
g,
and joined Taylor in her quest for a cell signal. I wanted to call my mom to let her know I’d be home soon. I hoped this time would be different than the other zillion times I tried to make a call from down here but was disappointed as always when I saw I had no bars. I held the button to turn it off—trying to save what was left of its battery—and dropped it back into my bag. Amber groaned. I turned toward her to see what was going on. She was bent forward, clutching her stomach and groaning with a pained expression.

“Amber, are you okay?” I stood up to check on her.

“I don’t feel too hot,” she moaned, falling onto the floor and curled up into a ball, still clutching her stomach.  

“Amber?” Brendan was on his feet.

Amber gagged and made a retching sound. Out came a stream of foul smelling black liquid all over Mason’s rug. Everyone else jumped to their feet, scattering away from her. I instinctively took a step back, not wanting to get any of that stuff on my shoes. Mason mumbled complaints about his rug from behind me as Amber lay on her side, groaning in pain.

“Maybe we should get her some hel
p,
” Kaci said.