The Unexpected Life of Carnegie Lane (29 page)

“Katalie, we can’t change what’s happened. You can’t ditch her now.”

“I don’t want to ditch her Nate…I have no intention of ditching her, but do you have any idea what this is going to do to my reputation?”

“Kat stop thinking about your job, just for one minute, and think about her.!”

“Yeah, OK. Let’s do that…shall we?”

“Don’t you dare blame her for this! I will do everything I can to protect her. Do you understand that? I don’t care if you’re my sister or who you are…I’m not going to leave her alone because of this.”

Katalie could hear the panic in his voice. Nate was scared for her. He had already become protective of Carnegie, possibly overly so. There was only one reason, why he would do that.

“Nate I know you want to protect her at all cost, and I know why. I think your confusing her with someone she’s not. No matter what you think she isn’t….” She stopped talking then, realizing what she was saying, might not be so well received.

“She isn’t what?” Asked Nate impatiently, curious as to where she was leading with this.

“She isn’t Taylor….Nate.” There, she had said it, although it wasn’t that well received.

He could feel the blood begin to drain from his face, and he became numb. Nate’s heart began to beat a little faster. He was back there, back at the scene of that accident.

“
I won’t leave you Taylor, I promise… I won’t let you go…
”

But he had to, he had no choice, they took her away. Katalies voice was bringing him back to now. The phone still up against his ear.

“NATE…TALK TO ME!” She was screaming at him.

“I have nothing to say to you Kat. Not now, not ever.” He hung up the phone and tried to call Carnegie. Her phone was engaged. Leonie burst into his room, and began talking at a million miles an hour.

“I’ve got security heading over to her place now. I’ve spoken to her and told her what to say, and what to do. Kids are staying home. I’m getting confirmation now on the background stories.”

“Leonie…” He said, although it was as if he wasn’t really there.

“Yes?” She asked…cautiously.

“Can you just do what you have to do? I’m not in the head space to deal with this right now.”

“Sure…Nate…You OK?”

“Nope…I’m not.” He turned and walked into his room, shutting the door behind him. It was the first time Leonie had seen him crack under pressure. She had no idea why.

The circus of horrors continued for the next week and a half, all day every day and long into the night. There was no doubt in her mind, she was in trouble. Carnegie didn’t know where to turn. She had no friends in Bundaberg to even help her. There was three days till she left for London, which was the last place in the world she wanted to be. She was sitting in the corner of her room, when her mobile rang. It was Nate. She hadn’t spoken to him since before this mess started.

“Oh Nate, what have I done.” She almost started crying.

“Nothing…this is not your fault.”

“I never ever did what they say I did, you know that don’t you?”

“Yep…I know.”

“What do I do to fix it.”

“You can’t, it just needs time to be forgotten.”

“And…what about us?” Carnegie didn’t move a muscle when she asked that question. She held her breath, waiting for the answer.

“Go to London Carnegie, nothing’s changed.” Yet she felt like it had, she could feel the shift.

“Something’s changed.” She said, ready to face the inevitable ‘
you’re totally dumped
’ moment.

“Hey, look babe. I’m still here. I’m just trying to get through this on my end. It makes for double the day when you fight the cameras like I have been. Just give it time to cool off, the story will end. I know it. I’ve seen this a million times.”

“Fine…” She said bluntly. “I have to go.”

“I’ll talk to you soon, Carnegie. I promise.”

“Yep…talk soon.” She hung up, feeling nothing but numb.

It didn’t matter where she tried to go, someone recognized her. Carnegie went to the supermarket, inconspicuously of course, with two burley body guards on either side of her, and one standing next to her car. When she was in there, two girls asked her if she was Nate Bowman’s girlfriend. She didn’t know how to answer since her last phone call hadn’t been that encouraging. At the checkout, someone asked her if she was really a Rock Star killer.

That one threw her a little more than the last. When she went to the chemist for some head lice foam for Sienna, the old man behind the counter smiled at her, just as he always did.

“Still not gone hey?”He commented lightheartedly.

“What gone?” She asked, wondering what aspect of her life he was referring to.

“Nits…” he said, as he handed her the package.

“Oh, no, I don’t think they ever will be.”

“Don’t look now, but there are three photographers out the front of the store. Do you want to go through the back?” He asked, still no hint of judgment in his voice, just sympathy.

“Oh! Thank you. That would be great.”

She walked to the back of the store and then into a back room, the two security guards went back to her car to drive it around to meet her.

“I don’t know you very well, Carnegie Lane, but I know one thing, you’re no junkie, you’re no murderer and you’re a good mum. Just be careful what you say, when those reporters catch up with you. If you speak when you’re angry, you will make the best speech you’ll
ever regret
. Keep your head high, and walk past them as if you know nothing.”

“How do you know all this?” She questioned, looking into the sincere eyes of an old man.

“I was a journalist once. They don’t care about you, you’re just meat. I learnt that the hard way when one of the people my story was about committed suicide. I quit, that very day. It’s not worth it, well it wasn’t for me.”

“I understand why they did that…”

“It’s hard, but do you know why they are interested in anything you do? Because you matter, and hey, good for you! You’re dating a Rock Star… So what?
You
are Carnegie Lane, you’re an Author, and you’re going to be just fine…Trust me.”

Carnegie hugged him, and thanked him for his kind words and the secure exit. She opened the back door with her package in hand and jumped into her car. Out the front of her home was the media exposé she was almost used to now. She ignored them as she walked inside, and made arrangements for the twins to be at school the following day for exams. Her alibi was the headmaster, who had learned a valuable lesson about lies and innuendo from the incident with the twins. His school had raised a fortune because of this family, he wasn’t about to condemn them now.

Her ex-husband turned up, just as he was supposed to, the day before she left, although she had no concept of time. Luckily, Leonie had a team of minders around her, organizing her every move. He didn’t say much about what was going on. He better than anyone knew the truth, that it was all false. He lived those moments with her, yet he was defenseless to help, having been advised by his own lawyers to stay out of it. He was also not impressed that his ex wife had been implicated in a series of media sitcoms. All of them had thrown a questionable light on his own past in some way. Out of the two of them, his had been the most questionable to begin with.

Nate had continued to play his concerts, which were unscathed from the media hype surrounding him. He brought the full house down every show. He made his way through the interviews, avoiding the conversation as to his involvement with Carnegie as best as possible, a twang of guilt hitting him every time he avoided the ongoing drama and didn’t defend her. Kat had told him, that her lawyers had suggested he back off for a while, just till the heat had shifted, and they could answer the media with their own version of the story. Since he started the mess in the first place, he agreed to do just that. He missed her badly. He also felt like he had abandoned her when she needed him the most. It was unfair, how this game had played out for both of them.

That night, he lay in bed alone, thinking about his life till now. Strange how life can only be understood backwards, yet it needed to be lived forward. The cruelest recognition of your reality is hindsight. There were a million things he remembered that were deep in his past… it was his mothers words that came to him, giving him comfort and some clarity of mind.

“
My beautiful boy, I know it hurts, but don’t you see? To get to the end of your rainbow, you first have to walk through the rain.
”

Nate’s mind went back to the night they ran through the park as the rain began to fall, leaving them gloriously soaking… and then, she sang to him. It was those memories he held onto; it was
that
very second he fell in love with Carnegie Lane. When he closed his eyes to sleep, he would see her. She would always age backwards and turn into Taylor in his dreams. She was the only other thing on this planet he was not prepared to let go of, even though it was exactly what Taylor needed him to do.

I woke up today in London

As the plane was touchin’ down

All I could think about was Monday

Maybe I’d be back around

“
Landing in London”

Written by: B. Arnold, M. Roberts, T. Harrell, C. Henderson

3 Doors Down – Seventeen Days Album 2005

16

Carnegie
said a tearful goodbye to those children. She was sad to be leaving the twins behind with so many unanswered questions. Their father was most likely the best one to answer them other than her, since he had been present at the time all of these events happened. The ones that had been twisted around into something so untrue and sinister it made her sick to think about it.

She caught her flight to Brisbane, and from there, she caught her plane to Heathrow Airport in London. At least once she was in the air, the cameras stopped. She was for the first time, anonymous amongst people and if they knew who she was, no one said anything. Carnegie closed her eyes; she was preparing to spend the next few hours sleeping. She had missed it.

Katalie had been talking to Lilli, although, Lilli had been careful to choose her words when they discussed Taylor. She filled Kat in on the finer points, ones that could never be seen by one as young as she was, when Taylor died. Lilli tried to explain who she was to Nate, how much he suffered at the time and exactly what it was that she believed Carnegie had come to represent. It felt to her, as if the past was opening up and was about to collide with the present. What Lilli wanted to know the most was why Carnegie Lane was significant. Why had Taylor chosen
her
to be the replacement that was impossible to exist?

Taylor had no equal in this world. She was perfect, in every way. Taylor was talented, beautiful and had a grand future, possibly on a similar path to the one Nate himself had taken. It was Taylor who was the singer, the songwriter, the model. Nate was hoping to become a pilot. Never had he even picked up a musical instrument before he lost her. There was no indication he had any talent at all.

When he began to write his songs, it was if he was almost tranced. When his first album became an international hit, almost immediately, everyone was happy for him. Still, underneath it all, Lilli knew there was more to it than anyone knew. Over time she had forgotten the circumstances of Nate’s success after the loss of Taylor.

“Kat, can I have a copy of that story Carnegie wrote? I’m curious to see what attracted Nate in the first place.”

“I don’t have any pre-release copies yet. I’ll send you one soon though, if you like.”

“No…Kat, hear me. I think I really need to read that book.”

“What is it with my family? All of you want to read it, as if it holds some big secret.”

“It just might.”

“Your all insane…It’s just a book.”

“Let me judge that for myself. Kat, I’m doing this for Nate.”

Kat felt a twinge of jealousy. As far as she could see, Lilli and Nate didn’t spend a lot of time together. It was she that was closest to her brother, closer than the others. Why all of a sudden, were Lilli and Jason talking and discussing things that Kat herself had absolutely no memory of? Even though she had been filled in on some of it, her siblings keeping it a secret and never telling her any of this once she was old enough, felt like betrayal.