The Unexpected Life of Carnegie Lane (25 page)

Katalie Bowman was at that moment, sitting in her apartment in London, going over the publishing schedules before she went to bed. The publishers had set the date for Carnegie’s book to be printed and distributed… 4th September. It was now July, so there wasn’t a lot of time to get her ready. Kat was also aware that right now, Nate and Carnegie were in Brisbane, together. She also knew this was the final night for the Brisbane concert. As much as she disapproved of what was happening, her brother Jase had convinced her to leave it be. That maybe, just maybe, this was exactly how it was supposed to happen.

Kat set tentative dates for August, making loose bookings. She needed Carnegie Lane here for at least a month, recognizing she might have to make do with a lot less time than that. Then, later, there would be a certain amount of set tours for promotion. At the very least, she needed her here for the release and for the initial promotion. She figured Carnegie Lane had a week, maybe two up her sleeve to get organized and come to London.

She looked at her watch and counted the hours between the two countries figuring that it was 7am in Brisbane. Carnegie Lane would be awake by now. It was time to get her head around her own future.

The phone rang a couple of times before Carnegie went looking for it.

“Hello” She said, still half asleep. Nate began waking up a little more.

“Hi Carnegie. It’s Kat, how are you? Hope I didn’t wake you?” She said, although right now, she didn’t care if she had.

“Nope, I’m awake. I’m good! How are you?”

“Fantastic, hey, how’s the concert? Are you having fun?”

“Yeah I am. It’s been amazing.”

“Great, tell that brother of mine he better behave, or he will have me to answer to. OK!”

Carnegie felt all of a sudden very squashed in between the two siblings.

“Yeah, I’ll tell him.”

“Now, reason I called, is…you have a release date. You ready for this?”

“Yep…”

“Fourth of September, the first of your books roll out into stores across London. You need to be here for that date. You also need to be here before that. So I’m calling now to get you to get your head around coming here on or around the tenth of August, and staying until the launch. Sorry about the short notice.”

All the blood drained from her face. The tenth of August was way too soon. The girls had exams, and who would come and stay with them? She could call her mother…but she would never handle the kids on her own. Suddenly all the fun she had just had, was replaced by absolutely… nothing.

“Carnegie? Are you still there?” Kat thought she had lost her for a moment.

“Yeah…I’m still here, I’m just trying to think….Kat I need a couple of days on this. Can I call you back. I need to find babysitters.” Carnegie was sitting up now, Nate was trying to get wind of the conversation, since it had appeared to cause nothing but distress on this end.

“Ok, well, call me when your home. Let me know what you work out. It’s really important that you do this. All the travel and accommodation will be taken care of, don’t worry about that. Your advance was transferred to your bank two days ago, so you should be ok on your end.’

With everything that was happening, Carnegie had almost forgotten about the advance, she suddenly felt empowered. She had money!

“Kat…I’ll figure it out. Thanks for calling me. And I’ll come up with something.”

“Awesome…well talk soon Carnegie. Say hi to Nate for me.”

“Here, say hi to him yourself. I’ll put him on.” Carnegie wasn’t thinking straight when she did that. Once again her world was in a spin. She had kids to think about, and a career to create. Juggling the two of them alone was proving to be a nightmare, before she even got it off the ground.

“Kat…What’s going on?” Was the first thing Nate said, since he was sensing Carnegie’s sudden distress.

“What time is it there?” Kat asked suddenly confused.

“About 7am...close to it.”

“Why are you with Carnegie at 7am? Or shouldn’t I ask.”

“Depends what you want to know.”

“Do I want to know?” Kat began to squirm a little more. They were more than friends. Now she wanted to kill him all over again. “No, I don’t. Listen, her book releases early September. I need her here by the tenth of August to get the publicity started.”

“How is she going to do that? The girls have their exams.”

“Nate…stop…don’t start making this hard for me ok.”

He knew he had to stop. He had crossed a line, and was now in her territory.

“Kat…We will figure something out. She will be there. I’ll make sure of it. That what you want to hear?” He was trying to be helpful.

WE…WE!
Was all Kat could think… “I’ll call her back in a couple of days. Nate… just, just be…” She went to say something else, but changed her mind.

“Talk soon, Kat. I love you.”

“Love you too.” Kat hung up the phone and drove her face into the nearest pillow.

“What’s up with you?” Jase asked. He was sitting at her coffee table with the toaster completely pulled apart.

Kat looked at him and the toaster, deciding that was the least of her problems.

“Do you know where my client is right now?”

“In Brisbane.” He said, since he already knew where she was.

“Well... yeah.” Kat decided she didn’t want to relive her speculation with Jase. Since he might actually say it was sweet or something. Underneath it all, Katalie still felt ripped off by her brother. She had taken everyone’s advice, and decided that if she can get this book out, without complication, she had nothing to worry about. There wasn’t long now…And besides, what could go wrong…in a month!

“I’m going to bed…” She said as she got up off the floor and gathered her notes together. She’d had enough for one day.

Richard Toll had gathered more photographs of Carnegie Lane. Not only did he have pictures of her out the side of the venue with
The Stickermen
two weeks before a fatal overdose, he also had photographs of her with other bands. All underground punk rock, and very alternative rock groups from around Sydney in the Mid 80’s. His theory that she was a groupie, who had a checkered past with drugs and the underground scene in Sydney was slowly falling into place. They were only photos and circumstantial evidence, yet it was enough for him to show the world that what Nate Bowman had, wasn’t what she seemed. Truth or not. His inside contact had told him her book,
Impossible Things
was being released in early September. He knew she had spent the last three days in Brisbane with Nate and the band.

He was just about ready to send out his photographs to the magazines and papers who would snap them up and pay any price. With the story he could present, he had enough to keep Carnegie Lane and Nate Bowman’s apparent romance on the front of every magazine cover for months, even if he never saw her again. He sent off an email to Tye, who he hoped had been following them closely in Brisbane. The more pictures of both of them together now, the longer he could keep this story alive. Everything in his mixed up world of lies and deceit, was falling perfectly into place.

It was 10 am by the time Carnegie went and found the kids. They were all happily doing their own thing, although Sobian and Olivia gave her the eye when she walked in the door. Neither of them said anything, they didn’t disapprove of what was beginning to unfold in their life, in fact, they kind of liked it. As for the little ones, they were way too young to understand. She just sat there, looking at them, wondering who would take care of them, if she managed to go to London. Right now she was aware there was twenty four hours left to be with Nate before she went back to Bundaberg, and he went forward to Sydney. There were a million moments in between those hours that she refused to miss, needing to burn him into her soul before she left him behind.

“I need you both to watch Connor and Sienna…Here’s my credit card, take them to the movies or something.”

“Where are you going?” Olivia asked. There was an inkling that she was missing out on something even better than free reign of the card…she was just making sure.

“I’m going with Nate.”

“Where?”

“I don’t know Olivia…just...wherever he is going. Don’t ask questions. I’ll be back later.”

“Mum...” Sobian went and grabbed her by the arm, just before she turned back to her own room.

“Yep...” Carnegie answered, almost defensively.

“Are you happy?” It was the only thing she needed to know.

“Gloriously happy.” She kissed Sobian gently on the cheek. Sobian smiled…

“That’s good.”

Carnegie left the room, and Sobian couldn’t get the grin off her face.

“Liv...” She said..

“Yep…”

“I think Mum’s landed herself a winner.”

“Yep…been thinking that myself Sobi.”

“Liv…”

“Yep…”

“This is so Awesome…!”

“Yep!.” Olivia squeezed her sister’s hand, struggling to contain herself. They never saw it coming, but right now, their lives were absolutely perfect. Even if it did mean they had to babysit more.

Carnegie left her room in the full control of her seventeen year olds, and walked out in the hall, where she was met my Leonie, who was just going up to Nate’s room with the day’s inventory.

“Well well well!” She said, jokingly.

“Hey Leonie…how are you.”

“Not as good as you…apparently. Oh, and I spoke to Kat a while ago, she is organizing your flights, do you want me to do anything for you while I’m still here?”

“Quit your job and come mind my children for me” Carnegie said affectionately.

“Not a chance...”

“I so understand why…”

Leonie got out her card and opened Nate’s door. It was the first time Carnegie was aware, that she had one. It didn’t worry her, well it shouldn’t have worried her, or even allow her to feel anything, yet strangely, it did. Not that she would ever say so.

“Well are you coming in or just going to stand out there in the hall way?” Leonie asked, bringing Carnegie back to now.

“Oh… sorry...miles away.”

Nate was munching on a selection of food that had been delivered from the kitchen. He walked over to Carnegie and kissed her on the cheek, then gave his full attention to Leonie.

“Ok, firstly. Winners of the meet and greet MTV comp. That’s at eleven. Then all of you have to do the adverts for songs for the show. After that, you have the second Meet and Greet, there’s about ten in that one, will take a while. Photos with the cast of some local TV show, or some of them…Not sure on that. We have to go see Roland Phillips, he is the new sound engineer and wants fifteen minutes of your time. Sound check is later, it’s at five thirty, then you have an interview for a news show, they are coming to the show tonight. Got that?”

“Yep.” He said, with a mouthful of toast.

“OK, I’m just going to get the others, oh, Carnegie, are you coming along?”

Leonie had become very matter of factly.

“If that’s OK…” She continued before Nate cut her off.

“Yes she is. I’m not letting her out of my sight till I have to.”

Leonie just looked at the pair of them and shook her head, with a smile. “I only need to know about car space. I’ll be back, we are out of here in ten minutes. Be ready.” Then she was gone, like a tornado in action.