It takes two weeks to gather the necessary information and get the essential people to agree to be where I need them to be, when I need them to be.
It’s a weird two weeks. In the moments when I’m frantically planning and plotting and going over the details with Katie, I can forget, almost, the whole reason I’m doing this. But when I stop moving, even for a minute, it hits me. Connor is dead, dead, he’s never coming back. That’s when everything stops, and I get lost in that thought.
I get lost.
And this makes me want to get really lost, bottom-of-a-bottle, end-of-a-line lost, so I’m attending as many meetings as I can, and I’ve got my sponsor on speed-dial. In reality, the only thing that’s saving me is the impossibility of me going anywhere where I could score something right now—unless someone else did it for me, which they won’t.
Once a day, Bernard sends me a roundup of the craziest stories circulating out there.
The AA meetings you’re attending are really a front for a group of addicts getting together to shoot up.
Now that Connor’s gone, you’re playing for the other team again and have reunited with your first girlfriend, Kate Sandford.
You really are pregnant [insert picture of me looking “healthy”], and the baby is Connor’s.
Your parents are setting up another intervention for you, and they’ll be filming it for a “very special episode” of that show, Intervention.
Mostly these stories make me laugh—which I assume is why Bernard’s sending them to me, either that or he’s worried they’re true—and strengthen my resolve to go through with the plan. Sometimes, though, they send a shiver down my spine because they’re hitting a little too close to home. Like a thousand monkeys sitting at a thousand typewriters: someday one of them is going to hit on the truth.
I just hope it’s not before Thursday.
“Are they all in there?” I ask Bernard, pacing in the hall outside the hotel conference room at the Ritz, where I had the disastrous press conference a month ago.
“Yup. Every single one.”
“What did you have to say to get them here?”
“Depends on who we’re talking about. But the word ‘intervention’ worked pretty well.”
“It would.”
He puts his hand on my shoulder. “You sure you’re ready?”
“I’ve got to go through with it now, don’t I?”
“Probably.”
“Let’s do it.”
“Knock ’em dead in there.”
I square my shoulders and enter the room, Bernard following close behind. Eleven people are sitting in a circle, like they used to do in group back in rehab: The four paparazzi I’ve identified as the most influential/rabidly interested in me. Olivia. My parents. Katie. Henry. My sponsor.
Sitting at the head of them all, ready to direct the proceedings, is my former therapist from rehab, Saundra.
Saundra’s a short, plump, woman in her fifties who has let her hair go its natural grey. She loves all-things-dog, as Katie would say, and often expresses that love through clothing. Today’s no exception. She’s wearing a hand-knitted sweater with the words “A House Is Not a Home without a Dog” stitched across her large breasts.
This is going to be awesome.
“Amber, hello,” Saundra says in her best obey-me-or-face-the-consequences voice. “Glad you could join us. And dressed appropriately too.”
I plaster a smile on my face. I used to make costumes in rehab from the craft supplies and wear them to group.
You know, for kicks.
“What’s all this?” I ask in the little-girl-lost voice I perfected on The Girl Next Door. “Is everyone here just for me?”
“Of course we are, dear,” my mother says through her perfect teeth, her diction clipped. “It’s an intervention. I believe you’re familiar with them by now?”
A low shot, but I can take it. I have to.
I look around the room, making eye contact with each of this motley crew one by one. The paparazzi are fiddling with their phones, clearly taking pictures despite our rules. Katie’s smoothing her hands over a pile of file folders sitting in her lap. Henry’s smiling at me encouragingly. My parents seem annoyed that there’s no one here to film this. (Okay, that’s just my interpretation of their sour expressions, but I bet I’m right). My sponsor’s impassive: not for the plan, but not against it either. Olivia’s wearing a loose blouse, and her face is paler than usual. I get to Saundra last, and she’s giving me the look she gave me when she told me I could finally leave rehab.
Her words that day come back to me.
“You’re strong, Amber. Remember that on the outside and you’ll do fine.”
I am strong.
I am strong.
I am strong.
“All right, folks,” I say into the bated silence in my real voice. “Sorry to disappoint you, but this isn’t an intervention. At least not for me. Shall we get started?”
“So,” I say now that I have their attention, pulling a letter out of my pocket. “You know how this works, right? I tell you how your actions have been affecting my life, and when we’re done, you agree to stop what you’ve been doing and seek help.”
“I’m not going to rehab,” scoffs Paparazzo Mike from the press conference, his wife and partner in crime nodding her head vigorously next to him. “In fact, I’m not staying.”
“Oh, I’d stay if I were you,” Henry says, standing as if to block him from leaving. “Trust me.”
A quiet guy, Henry, but you don’t want to cross him.
Mike looks chastened but also ready to bolt at the first opportunity. His wife’s shooting daggers out of her eyes if that were, you know, actually possible.
“Don’t worry,” I say. “You’re not going to have to go to real rehab, though some of you might need it, and if you do, I’d highly recommend the Cloudspin Oasis.”
“For what?” asks that Johnson guy who was also at the press conference.
“We’ll get to that,” Saundra says. “But first I think you all owe the favour of your attention to Amber.”
She nods at me and I start reading.
“Each of you is here because you’ve all had a part to play in what my life is like these days. Whether you believe it or not, I’ve been clean since I left rehab. I’ve been working really hard to show everyone that I’m okay, that I can be trusted, that I deserve a second chance. But you all have made that impossible. So I’m here today to ask you to stop.
“Mike, Johnson, et al., I know you think it’s your job, but every time you follow me around, every time you take a picture that makes me look as if I’m in trouble, you’re undoing what I’m working for. I get why you do it. I get that this is how you get paid, but don’t you think you’ve made enough off of me? Isn’t there something better you could be doing with your lives?
“I’m not saying you’re responsible for Connor’s death or anything, but he hated you guys and what you did to him, to me, to his friends. He hated it. It’s not your fault he had a drug problem, or that the public buys the crap you sell, but you sure don’t help. People believe what they read, especially where there’s a photo that seems to confirm it. And, sometimes, when you know everyone’s waiting for you to fail, it makes it easier to do so. You know you’re kind of living up to expectations, and there’s some comfort in that.”
The paparazzi are squirming in their seats, looking uncomfortable but not convinced.
I turn to my parents. “Mom and Dad, I know you think you’re trying to help me when you go on TV, but you’re not. Because every time you do that, you’re believing the worst of me. Instead of giving me the benefit of the doubt, you take whatever the media throws out there as true. I know I’ve given you lots of reasons to believe them, and I know things haven’t been good between us in a long time, but you could’ve tried asking me first. Just once.
“To be completely honest, lots of the time, I think I hate you. But I don’t want to hate you. If you took the time to know me again, you’d see that most days I’m doing all right. I’d do a lot better if I had your silent support.”
I steal a glance at my parents. My mom’s crying and my dad’s lip is quivering.
Am I a terrible person if this gives me some satisfaction?
Maybe this will be enough to convince them, at least.
Then again, maybe not.
“Olivia. I know you’re sorry, but you really hurt me. I’m not sure I’m ever going to be able to trust you again, which makes me so sad because it’s hard to imagine my life without you in it. But there’s a toxic part of us together, clearly. Why else would you have . . . done what you—” I stop as a sob escapes her. A lump starts to form in my throat and I don’t think I can go through with it. I can’t throw Olivia under the bus simply to get myself out from under it.
I make a decision. Come what may.
“Your agreeing to be here today means a lot. I’ve been thinking about it, and about what happened. That’ll be between us, okay? You don’t have to worry.”
Olivia slumps down in her seat, the air let out of the balloon of her worry. I feel relieved that I don’t have to be the bad guy. I just hope the plan still works.
I turn back to the paparazzi. “I don’t expect you guys to believe what I say. Why would you? Why would anyone? That’s why Sue’s here. She’s my sponsor. Has been for a long time. I’ve authorized her to confirm I’m clean. That I’ve passed every drug test she’s ever given me, including the one I took this morning.”
Sue nods.
“How do we know she’s who you say she is?” Johnson asks.
“Because I say so,” answers Saundra with as much authority as someone in a dog sweater can muster.
“Me too,” says Henry.
“Me three,” says Katie.
“Me four,” says Olivia. “And everyone knows that Rule Number Five of Being a Super Famous Person is: Don’t lie about your drug status when you’re trying to win over your enemies.”
I’d laugh at that one if it wasn’t for my dad saying, “Me five.”
Now it’s my lip that’s quivering.
“Me fucking six,” says Bernard.
“Yeah, well, so, even if that’s true,” says Mike, “why should we do what you want?”
“Because you’re good people, really deep down?” I say hopefully.
“This is my job. I have a mortgage to pay. Mouths to feed.”
“So you’re not going to stop?”
The paparazzi are silent.
I sigh. “I thought that might be your answer so . . . after the carrot comes the stick.” I turn to my parents. “You remember how this works, right? If you won’t do what I ask willingly, there have to be consequences. I don’t want to have to do this, but if you don’t stop, I’m cutting you off.”
My mother looks taken aback. “We’re doing fine without you, dear.”
“Uh, well, no you aren’t. Right, Dad?”
My dad looks at his hands. “Yes, well, dear, um, we took quite a hit in the last stock market crash and . . . Amber’s been topping up our account every month.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” my mother asks.
“I . . .”
“I asked him to keep it quiet,” I say, because what the hell—one more lie in my lifetime won’t hurt.
My dad looks up at me, and for the first time in a long time I see what I’ve been looking for. Pride.
My mother surprises me too. “Thank you, Amber. That’s very generous of you.”
“You’re welcome. Do we have a deal?”
“Of course. Even without the money. You only had to ask. You’re our daughter.”
Would it really have been that simple? All these years? So easy to say now, and impossible to confirm.
“That . . . that means a lot. Okay. Now, for the rest of you . . . Take it away, Katie.”
Katie looks nervous but assured as she addresses the paparazzi. “I’ve got a folder here with each of your names on it. Inside is just a taste of what it’s like to be on the other end of your cameras. Shall we begin with you, Johnson?”
She flips open the top folder. “Oh, yes. You sure hang out in a lot of parks. At night. I wonder what your wife would think about that?”
“But, but, but . . . that’s blackmail!”
“Is it really?” I say. “Taking pictures of people when they’re in public places and publishing their bad deeds for all to see is a crime, is it?”
“You just threatened me, and I’ve got it on tape.” He holds up his phone, waving it back and forth while it flashes that it’s recording. “I wonder how much I could sell this for?”
“I’m pregnant with Connor’s baby!” Olivia says.
“You’re what?” Katie asks.
“I’m pregnant with Connor Parks’ baby,” Olivia says again, then buries her face in her hands, sobbing.
Henry scans the shocked faces. “You all get that?”