Chapter Text
The music in the venue hits hard enough to vibrate the runway floor. Bass thrumming beneath Lottie’s heels in deep, steady pulses while gold light pours over the stage. The air inside feels overheated despite the winter rain outside. It’s thick with perfume, camera flashes, and too many beautiful people packed beneath cathedral ceilings draped in black silk.
Someone screams her name from the crowd. Then a dozen more voices layer over each other all at once.
“Lottie!”
“Over here–”
“Look this way!”
She doesn’t react immediately. Timing part of it. Pausing before the glance back, the precise turn of her head beneath the lights, and the expression that never looks rehearsed no matter how many millions of dollars depend on it.
Lottie Matthews became famous at nineteen because she’s beautiful. She stays famous because she understands how to perform. By twenty six, she feels an audience the same way some people can feel the weather.
Tonight’s crowd wants untouchable, so she gives it to them. She stops at the end of the runway in gold silk and diamonds that sit heavy against her throat. One hand resting loose at her side while flashes explode across the room hard enough to leave white in her vision.
For a second, everything looks frozen. Phones are lifted in the dark. Champagne glasses are suspended in midair. Editors lean forward in their seats. Photographers practically climb over each other for the best angle.
The music drops lower and Lottie tilts her chin slightly. The room loses its fucking mind. She hears it happen. There’s a visible ripple moving through the audience.
Then the moment ends. Another model steps onto the runway behind her, and Lottie turns smoothly, fabric trailing behind her, while the crowd continues to applaud behind her.
The second the curtain closes behind her, the noise changes. Hands reach out for her immediately.
“Careful with the train–”
“Can someone grab the necklace?”
“Lottie, makeup touch up in five–”
“You were incredible, sweetheart.”
Bodies move around her in frantic orbit while assistants rush past carrying garment bags, clipboards, and phones buzzing nonstop with messages. Someone carefully unclasps one of the diamond bracelets from her wrist while another stylist fixes a strand of hair near her temple despite the show already being over.
Lottie stands relaxed through it all. Like she belongs to everybody a little. That’s the trick. The illusion of intimacy.
People think they know her because she touches easily. Because she smiles at them warmly and leans close enough during conversations to feel personal. She remembers names, kisses cheeks, and laughs softly into crowded rooms like she doesn’t mind being looked at all the time.
Lottie is very good at making people feel chosen. That doesn’t actually mean they are though.
A photographer appears near the makeup stations.
“Lottie, quick backstage portraits?”
She turns automatically. “Of course.”
More flashes. Light bouncing off her skin while someone behind the camera swears quietly under their breath in French. She gives them exactly what they want. Half lidded eyes with a slight smile. One shoulder angled toward the lens while diamonds glitter against exposed skin.
The photographer lowers the camera slowly afterward like he needs a second to recover from seeing her. It happens a lot. Lottie barely notices anymore.
“Baby.” A familiar voice drifts through the noise beside her.
Mari.
Lottie turns her head slightly as the other model steps closer, silk robe hanging loose over lingerie and long dark hair still pinned from the show. Mari smells like expensive perfume mixed with cigarettes underneath.
Last spring in Milan, they ended up tangled together in a hotel suite after an Armani afterparty neither of them wanted to attend. Mari laughed against Lottie’s mouth at four in the morning while city lights spilled across white sheets. Afterward, she asked if Lottie wanted breakfast.
Lottie ended up leaving before sunrise.
Now Mari smiles like she remembers that too. “You disappeared immediately after the show,” she says.
Lottie accepts a champagne flute from a passing tray but doesn’t take a sip. “I’m still here.”
“Physically.”
“That’s usually enough for fashion people.”
Mari laughs softly at that and steps into her space with casual confidence, fingertips brushing lightly along Lottie’s bare forearm. Most people hesitate before touching her. Not because she’s cold, but because she looks expensive. Mari never does.
“Come out tonight,” she says. “Everyone’s going to Le Carmen.”
Lottie glances toward the dressing room mirrors lined in gold bulbs where models and stylists blur together beneath clouds of hairspray and exhaustion.
Everyone always goes somewhere after a show. A club. A party. Another dimly lit room full of rich people pretending not to stare at each other. The city changes but the noise doesn’t.
“I’m tired,” Lottie says.
Mari tilts her head slightly. “Since when does that stop you?”
Lottie smiles. It’s not flirtatious this time. A soft no wrapped in pretty packaging. “Maybe I’m evolving.”
“Oh, that’s horrifying.”
“There’s help available for people affected by my growth.”
Mari laughs before leaning in to kiss both of Lottie’s cheeks. “You’re impossible.”
“Mmm.”
Then she disappears back into the blur of backstage chaos without pushing further.
That’s another thing people learn quickly about Lottie Matthews. You get one night. Sometimes not even that. There are women all over Paris who still look at her like unfinished business. Models, actresses, and socialites who spend exactly one perfect evening with her before realizing the perfection has an expiration date.
Lottie doesn’t mean to be cruel about it. She just doesn’t know how to stay once people start wanting something real from her.
An assistant appears beside her holding out her phone. “Your car’s outside.”
Lottie nods absently and hands off the untouched champagne flute. Someone else catches her lightly by the wrist before she can leave. A jewelry representative who’s older, wealthy, and smiling too hard.
“Darling, Cartier loved you tonight.”
“That’s good to hear.”
“They’re discussing a longer contract.”
“Mhmm.”
“You should come to dinner tomorrow. Everyone important will be there.”
Everyone important is always there. That’s the problems. Lottie smiles politely anyway. “Send the details to Gen.”
The woman squeezes her wrist affectionately before letting go. Another touch. Another person trying to anchor themselves to her for a second. By the time she finally escapes backstage, her face hurts from smiling.
-
Paris always looks softer in the rain. Streetlights blur gold against wet pavement while the car slides gently through crowded midnight streets lined with black umbrellas and glowing storefront windows. The city still buzzes with fashion week energy despite the hour. Photographers linger outside hotels hoping for glimpses of celebrities. Velvet ropes curl around overcrowded clubs. Every restaurant seems packed with beautiful people leaning too close across candlelit tables.
Lottie rests her temple against the cool glass of the window. Across from her, Gen scrolls through tomorrow’s schedule on an iPad with terrifying focus.
“You have Saint Laurent at eleven,” she says. “Then the Cartier dinner. Then more interviews.”
Lottie hums.
“And your father called twice.”
Another hum. Gen finally glances up.
“Are you listening to me?”
“Emotionally? No.”
“That tracks.”
Lottie smiles faintly at the window. Rain streaks downward in blurred lines outside while her phone buzzes nonstop beside her thigh. Text messages. Invitations. PR emails. Instagram notifications exploding after tonight’s show.
Everyone wants something. Sometimes Lottie wonders if anyone would notice if she stopped speaking entirely and simply continued standing beautifully in rooms. The terrifying part is that they probably wouldn’t.
When the car finally pulls outside the restaurant, flashes immediately explode against the windows. Gen sighs. “Animals.”
Lottie reaches automatically for the door handle. The second she steps onto the sidewalk, noise crashes over her again.
“Lottie!”
“Who are you wearing?”
“Can we get a comment?”
“One picture–”
The camera's flash so rapidly it almost looks like lightning. Lottie moves through it gracefully with her chin lifted. Her expression is composed and effortless beneath the streetlights reflecting off the wet pavement. People shout her name like they know her.
Inside, the restaurant glows low beneath enormous chandeliers. Everything dark wood, velvet, and expensive wine. Conversations layer together in half a dozen languages while waiters drift between tables carrying champagne bottles worth more than most people’s rent.
Several heads turn immediately when she enters. Lottie ignores them automatically.
“Do you know how humiliating it is being prettier than everyone in Europe?”
Lottie looks up. Jackie Taylor stands near the entrance in cream silk and diamonds with oversized sunglasses still perched on her nose despite the hour and location. Her hair falls in impossible, glossy waves over one shoulder while two men near the bar visibly forget what they’re talking about mid-conversation. Jackie doesn’t even glance at them.
Lottie leans back slightly in her chair. “Tragic, really.”
Jackie sighs dramatically while crossing the restaurant towards her. “Nobody understands the burden I carry.”
“You’re so brave.”
“I know.”
Then Jackie bends down to kiss both of Lottie’s cheeks before stealing the champagne sitting untouched beside her plate. “You weren’t drinking this, right?”
“I was emotionally supporting it.”
Jackie laughs and slides into the chair across from her.
Their friendship always feels easy in the way most things don’t. Maybe because Jackie understands fame without romanticizing it. She understands the exhaustion of constantly being looked at. The performance of desirability. The strange loneliness of becoming public property before your brain fully forms around it. Neither of them have to pretend around each other.
“You’re late,” Lottie says.
“I had another dinner first.”
“You always have another dinner.”
Jackie points at her immediately. “Don’t use my own material against me.”
“It’s not material if it’s true.”
Jackie takes another sip of champagne. “God, you were disgusting tonight by the way.”
Lottie blinks slowly. “Thank you?”
“The internet’s already in mourning. There are probably lesbians throwing themselves into the Seine as we speak.”
“That feels a touch dramatic.”
“You underestimate women.”
Lottie smiles despite herself. The waiter arrives and Jackie orders something outrageously expensive without opening the menu.
Around them, the restaurant buzzes softly with overlapping conversations and candlelight reflecting against crystal glasses. Somewhere near the back, someone starts laughing too loudly. Fashion executives lean across tables whispering about campaigns, scandals, and affairs like international diplomacy depends on it.
Jackie loosens slightly into her chair. “Anyway. There’s some afterparty on New York next week for their fashion week.”
Lottie reaches for her water glass, the condensation cold against her fingertips. “Thrilling.”
“You’re impossible to excite.”
“I’m exhausted.”
“You’re twenty six years old and internationally desired,” Jackie says. “Stop acting like you’re eighty.”
Lottie tips her head back slightly against the velvet booth. “Being internationally desired is actually very tiring.”
Jackie points toward her again with immediate vindication. “See? That. That’s why people want to fuck you.”
“Jesus Christ, Jackie.”
“I’m serious. You say things like a widow in a perfume commercial.”
Lottie laughs quietly into her glass before finally taking a sip of champagne for the first time that night. The alcohol settles warm and dull beneath her ribs. Around them, the restaurant continues glowing softly. Every surface reflects light somewhere. Candle flames flicker against expensive watches and polished silverware.
Beautiful people fill every table. Actresses. Designers. Models still wearing traces of runway makeup around tired eyes. Everyone looks expensive enough to belong there. Everyone looks lonely enough too.
Jackie glances down at her phone briefly before tossing it face down onto the table. “Did you hear me? There’s a band playing the afterparty.”
Lottie hums distractedly.
“A real band,” Jackie clarifies. “Not one of those weird DJs that look like they’ve never experienced human joy.”
“That narrows it down less than you think.”
Jackie ignores her. “Tai sent me clips earlier. Apparently they’re getting huge.”
“Mmm.”
“Lottie.”
“What?”
“The lead singer is kind of your type if your type was emotionally devastating.”
That gets her attention just enough for her to look at Jackie. “I don’t have a type.”
Jackie stares at her flatly for a full three seconds. “Blonde. Mean. Looks like she’d ruin your life.”
Lottie drags one finger slowly around the rim of her champagne glass. “...That’s not specific enough.”
Jackie bursts out laughing loud enough that several nearby tables glance over. “Oh my god,” she says. “At least you’re self aware.”
“Unfortunately.”
“She’s hot though.”
“That’s your professional opinion?”
“No,” Jackie says. “That’s my bisexual one.”
Lottie snorts softly through her nose. Jackie leans back into the booth after that, expression turning vaguely thoughtful while a waiter places tiny, aggressively artistic plates between them.
“She’s different from the people we usually end up around,” Jackie says eventually.
Lottie picks apart a piece of bread absently. “How profound.”
“I’m serious.” Jackie nudges her foot lightly beneath the table. “You know when somebody looks too alive?”
Lottie looks up again and Jackie shrugs one shoulder. “Like they’re one bad decision away from either making incredible art or setting a building on fire.”
“That sounds exhausting.”
“That sounds exactly like your type.”
Lottie rolls her eyes, but there’s no real bite behind it.
The conversation drifts after that. Fashion gossip. A designer Jackie hates. An actress who apparently cried in the Dior bathroom after discovering her boyfriend cheating on her with some DJ named Nico.
Lottie listens with half her attention while the restaurant blurs softly around them. Somewhere near the bar, a man in an expensive suit keeps glancing toward her every couple of minutes like he’s trying to decide whether approaching her would ruin his life.
Lottie’s gotten very good at identifying the exact moment people start projecting things onto her. It happens fast. They see beauty at first. Then mystery. Then suddenly they’ve built entire personalities for her in their heads without ever hearing her speak for more than five minutes.
Jackie interrupts her thoughts by kicking her lightly beneath the table. “You disappeared again.”
“I’m literally sitting right here.”
“Physically,” Jackie says smugly.
Lottie narrows her eyes. “You’re insufferable tonight.”
“And yet you adore me.”
That part is true, unfortunately.
Dinner stretches late into the night after that. Dessert arrives mostly untouched. More champagne appears. People stop by their table occasionally to greet them. Designers kissing Jackie’s cheeks. Stylists touching Lottie’s shoulder lightly while complementing the show. Executives lingering just a little too long in conversation because proximity to beautiful women makes powerful people greedy.
Lottie handles all of it automatically with warm smiles and soft laughter at exactly the right moments. By the time they finally leave the restaurant, rain still shimmers against the sidewalks outside. Photographers wait near the curb immediately.
“Lottie!”
“Jackie!”
“Together, please–”
Flashes burst sharp and white against the dark. Jackie slides her sunglasses back onto her face despite it being nearly one in the morning.
“Nothing humbles me like seeing candid photos of myself.”
“You don’t know what humility is.”
“That’s true.”
Lottie smiles faintly as the cameras continue snapping around them. For a second, Jackie reaches over and squeezes her wrist lightly before climbing into her car.
“Text me when you land in New York,” Jackie says through the open window.
“You’ll survive without me for a few days.”
“Debatable.”
Then the car disappears into Paris traffic, leaving Lottie standing briefly beneath a canopy of camera flashes before her own driver opens her door.
The hotel suite feels cavernous when she gets back. Silent in that luxury hotel way where everything’s too clean and expensive to feel lived in.
Lottie drops her heels near the doorway and crosses slowly through the suite, exhaustion finally settling heavy into her bones now that nobody’s looking at her anymore.
She stands in front of the bathroom mirror for a long moment without moving. Makeup still sharp around her eyes. Hair still perfectly styled. Diamonds glittering at her throat.
She looks exactly the same as she does on the runway. Like she stopped belonging to herself somewhere between the flashes and applause before forgetting to ask for the pieces back.
Slowly, Lottie reaches up and unclasps the necklace from around her throat. Then the bracelets and the earrings. Each piece lands softly against the marble counters one by one. Without the jewelry, she suddenly looks younger.
She washes her face carefully beneath the warm hotel lights. By the end of it, her eyes look heavy in a way the cameras usually erase. Lottie stares at herself for another second before finally looking away.
The bed swallows her whole when she falls onto it. Her phone buzzes beside her almost immediately. Lottie ignores them all. Instead she opens Instagram mostly out of muscle memory and lets herself scroll mindlessly through post-show content. The comments blur together after a while.
god she’s unreal
i think if lottie matthews looked at me directly i’d actually die
she doesn’t even seem human
Lottie’s thumb keeps moving. Another video, campaign clip, or crowd of strangers wanting pieces of her. She stops on a concert video that fills the screen beneath flashing red stage lights and shaky phone camera quality.
holy shit Natalie Scatorccio is unreal live
Lottie almost keeps scrolling. Then the girl onscreen looks directly into the crowd while singing into a microphone like she’s trying to start a fucking riot instead of perform a song.
Her blonde hair is damp with sweat. Dark eyeliner smudged beneath sharp eyes. Rings flashing silver against the neck of a guitar while the crowd screams lyrics back at her hard enough to distort the audio.
There’s nothing polished about her. She looks alive in a way fashion people rarely do. Messy and sharp edged. A little mean. The kind of person who’d probably laugh in the face of luxury branding campaigns and five thousand dollar gowns.
Lottie watches her shove sweaty hair back from her forehead with the back of one tattooed hanf before leaning back into the microphone. The crowd loses it’s mind instantly. Natalie grins wild enough to make something low twist unexpectedly beneath Lottie’s ribs.
The comments fly by beneath the video.
i’d let her ruin my life actually
she sings like she’s in love with violence
the guitarist could literally step on my throat
Lottie snorts softly through her nose at the last one. The clip loops back to the beginning and for some reason, she watches it again. Which matters. Because Lottie Matthews never pauses for anyone.
~ ~ ~
Brooklyn smells like beer and wet concrete. The venue sits wedged between a tattoo shop and a closed liquor store with flickering neon in the window. The bass is already rattling through the walls hard enough to shake cigarette ash loose from the fire escape overhead.
A line curls halfway down the block despite the rain. People huddle underneath umbrellas and leather jackets, shivering in the cold while security checks IDs beneath buzzing red light.
Inside, the floor sticks under shoes. The air feels thick with sweat and cheap alcohol already soaked into the walls from years of shows exactly like this one. Tangled cords snake across the stage beneath flickering lights while roadies haul amps through clusters of people packed shoulder to shoulder near the barricade. Nobody here looks polished or expensive.
The green room is barely a room at all. Instead, it’s a cramped space behind the stage with a ripped leather couch, graffiti scratched into the walls, and exactly one functioning lamp casting weak yellow light across setlists and empty beer cans.
Van sits cross-legged on the floor drumming their drumsticks against one tattooed thigh while Shauna digs through a backpack looking for batteries.
“I’m serious,” Van says. “If one more music blog calls us ‘gritty’ I’m giving up.”
Natalie snorts softly from where she leans against the counter near the sink, cigarette hanging from her mouth while she tightens strings on her guitar.
“We’re from Jersey,” she says. “We are gritty.”
“That doesn’t mean shit.”
“See?” Van looks dramatically at Shauna. “Hostile work environment.”
Shauna finally finds the batteries and tosses them toward Van without looking up. “You deserve less rights.”
“Wow.”
Natalie grins around her cigarette as the room buzzes with their familiar chaos. It always does before a show. Arguments layered over sound checks and somebody inevitably losing something important ten minutes before they’re supposed to go onstage.
The three of them move around each other easily anyway. They’re comfortable enough to talk over one another without getting lost in it. Friends first. Band second.
Natalie met Van in ninth grade detention after punching somebody in the mouth for calling her trailer trash. Shauna transferred schools halfway through sophomore year and somehow ended up sitting with them at lunch after Van loudly told a football player to choke to death on a mozzarella stick.
They’ve been orbiting each other ever since.
“You look terrifying tonight,” Shauna says while checking pedals near the couch.
Natalie glances up. “That a compliment?”
“It’s an observation.”
Van squints toward Natalie dramatically. “No, she’s right actually.” They point one drumstick towards her face. “You’ve got this whole emotionally unavoidable rockstar thing happening right now.”
Natalie flips them both off automatically. “Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.”
She catches herself in the cracked mirror hanging crooked beside the lamp. She’s got messy eyeliner, silver rings crowded across both hands, and her leather jacket hanging off one shoulder. There’s a bruise blooming yellow along her forearm from where a mic stand fell into her two nights ago in Philly. She looks exhausted. Which usually means she looks her best.
The crowd outside screams suddenly at something and Van pauses. “Oh my god,” they say. “Do you think they finally figured out I’m the hot one?”
Shauna deadpans immediately. “No.”
“That’s fucked up, Shippy.”
A venue employee sticks his head through the doorway. “Fifteen minutes.”
Natalie nods once. The guy lingers a second too long after looking at her before awkwardly disappearing again.
Van watches him leave. “You know he almost walked into the wall just now.”
Natalie shrugs. “That’s between himself and God.”
The internet started getting weird about Natalie about six months ago. Before that, the band had fans. Now they have followers. Clips started going viral online seemingly overnight. Grainy concert videos with captions about religious experiences and emotional damage started appearing everywhere. Edits of Natalie onstage circulate across Twitter fast enough to make their streaming numbers explode.
Industry people started showing up after that. Label reps and magazine writers. Photographer trying very hard to pretend they’re too cool to be impressed.
Tonight’s show sold out at the box office before noon. The crowd already sounding rabid through the walls.
Shauna grabs one of Natalie’s cigarettes from the counter and lights it without asking.
Natalie narrows her eyes immediately. “You have your own, you know?”
“Yours taste better.”
“That’s not how cigarettes work.”
Van nods at them as she sips from her beer bottle. “That’s intimacy actually.”
Shauna ignores them both completely. Outside, the audience starts chanting something unintelligible loud enough to vibrate through the floorboards. Natalie feels it in her chest. It never gets old. No matter how exhausted she is or how badly the tour schedule wrecks her sleep. The second the crowd starts making noise like that, something inside her wakes up.
The venue employee appears again looking stressed. “Oh, uh–” He glances down at his clipboard. “Apparently there’s like… fashion week people here tonight?”
Natalie stares at him. “What?”
“Models. Influencers. Some magazine people.”
“Kill me now.”
Van immediately lights up. “You say that now until a supermodel asks you to ruin her life.”
Natalie rolls her eyes hard enough it almost hurts. “I’m not fucking a model.”
Shauna looks up from her bass. “That sounded defensive.”
“It fucking wasn’t.”
Van leans back against the couch looking delighted. “Imagine Natalie dating somebody rich.”
Natalie grabs a balled up setlist from the counter and throws it directly at their face. “Imagine shutting the fuck up.”
Van catches it with one hand. “See? You’re so passionate.”
The room dissolves back into noise after that. Someone knocks over a beer. Shauna starts arguing with a sound guy about monitor levels. Van steals another of Natalie’s cigarettes. Natalie tightens the strap around her guitar and tries not to think about the fact that people apparently pay actual money to watch her destroy herself publicly now.
It feels strange sometimes. The attention. Being onstage makes sense to her. The lights. The volume. The feeling of ripping something ugly out of yourself and making a room full of strangers feel it too. That part she understands. Being watched afterward? That’s a different story.
“Two minutes!” somebody yells from the hallway.
Natalie exchanges one look with Van and Shauna. The familiar one that says, “you ready?” without actually speaking.
Van bumps their fist against Natalie’s shoulder on the way toward the stage. “Try not to emotionally devastate too many lesbians tonight.”
Natalie smirks. “No promises.”
The lights cut the second they walk out and the room explodes. People scream hard enough that Natalie can barely hear the opening feedback ringing through the amps. Phones rise instantly above the crowd like flickering stars. Sweat already clings to the air before they even start playing.
Natalie steps toward the microphone and the audience surges forward so violently security immediately starts yelling near the barricade. There’s no separation between her and the crowd once the music starts.
That’s the thing people don’t understand. She doesn’t perform at them. She drags them into it with her. The first chord hits sharp and violent through the venue. The audience loses their fucking minds. Natalie feels the song settle into her body almost immediately.
The guitar fights under her hands the way it always does, strings biting hard against silver rings while she leans into the mic with messy hair falling into her face. Her voice comes out rough around the edges.
That’s why people keep coming back. Because Natalie Scatorccio sings like she’s bleeding something open instead of entertaining people. The crowd screams the lyrics back at her as beer sloshes across the floor and bodies crash together in the pit.
The air turns hot and electric within minutes. Natalie barely notices any of it anymore. Onstage, she becomes something sharper. She’s meaner and more alive. She stalks across the stage between songs with her guitar hanging low against black ripped jeans while sweat shines along her throat.
Somebody in the front row starts crying during the second song. Van notices and nearly misses their moment on the drums as they laugh. Natalie flicks her off over her shoulder without missing a lyric.
The audience screams louder and phones follow her every movement. Natalie grabs the mic stand hard enough her rings clang against the metal while she sings through the bridge of the next song like she’s trying to tear something apart with her bare hands.
That’s the thing people obsess over online. Her intensity and how dangerous she looks onstage. Like if somebody touched her wrong she might either kiss them or ruin their life.
By the fourth song, the venue feels molten. Natalie’s eyeliner smears darker beneath her eyes from sweat. Her hair sticks damply to the back of her neck. Her fingers move rough and fast over guitar strings while the crowd jumps hard enough to shake the floor.
She catches flashes of faces beneath the lights. People screaming lyrics and wanting pieces of her they don’t even understand. Natalie’s fame doesn’t come from perfection. It comes from collapse. From making chaos look beautiful enough that people mistake destruction for honesty.
By the final song, the crowds practically feral. Shauna’s bass rattles through the floor while Van nearly breaks a drumstick during the bridge. Natalie leans so far into the audience during the final chorus that security grabs her by the back of her belt automatically to stop her from getting dragged forward by screaming hands.
The room feels alive. One enormous heartbeat. Then the last chord crashes through the amps and silence hits for half a second. And the audience detonates.
Natalie steps back from the mic breathing hard while applause and screams crash over the stage. Sweat drips down the side of her throat and her chest aches pleasantly from singing that hard.
Van throws an arm around her shoulders while they bow dramatically toward the crowd. “Thank you, Brooklyn!” They yell.
The audience screams louder somehow. Backstage afterwards feels overheated and blurry. Everybody talking at once. Crews moving equipment. People crowding in the hallway. Someone shoving a beer into Natalie’s hand before she even fully gets offstage.
“Apparently some Victoria’s Secret girl was here tonight.”
Natalie wipes sweat from her forehead with the hem of her shirt. “Okay?”
The guy grins. “She kept staring at you.”
Van immediately makes the most obnoxious noise Natalie’s ever heard in her life. “Oh my god.”
Natalie laughs and reaches for another cigarette. “Shut the fuck up.”
-
The afterparty is already too loud before Natalie even makes it inside. Music leaks through the walls of the building in thick, expensive pulses, muffled by black out glass. Outside, security looks like they’re paid not to blink. Cars keep pulling up to the curb in a steady stream of tinted windows and camera flashes. People step out looking bored and perfect, one beautiful person after another, all dressed like they’ve never had to check their bank accounts before ordering another drink.
Natalie stands on the sidewalk in front of it all and immediately wants to leave. “Absolutely not,” she says.
Van, who is somehow already grinning, hooks an arm through hers before she can turn around. “Absolutely yes.”
“I hate this.”
“You hate everything. It’s your whole brand.”
“I hate this more, specifically.”
Shauna steps up beside them and stares up at the building. There is a line of photographers waiting her the entrance. Eventually, her eyes make their way back to Natalie. “This looks like somewhere fun goes to die.”
“Thank you,” Natalie says. “Shauna gets it.”
Shauna shrugs. “But I still want free drinks.”
“Fucking traitor.”
Van tightens their grip on Natalie’s arm and starts dragging her toward the entrance. “Come on. We played a sold out show. We’re hot. There are models inside. This is literally what bands are supposed to do.”
Natalie looks down at herself. She’s still in her leather jacket and black jeans. She knows her eyeliner is still smeared dark under her ees from sweat because nobody gave her time to fix it after the show. Her hair is still messy and damp at the ends from being shoved back with restless hands too many times to sit right. She smells like smoke and stage lights while everyone else around them smells like money.
“We don’t belong here,” she mutters.
Van looks delighted by that. “Exactly. That makes us interesting.”
The security guard at the door checks their names off a list without any emotion. His eys linger on Natalie, recognition hitting before he schools his face back into professional indifference. “Big show tonight,” he says.
Natalie blinks, caught off guard.
Van beams like a proud parent. “It was actually.”
“Van.”
“What? Accept praise, freak.”
They’re waived inside before Natalie can answer.
The club opens around them like something expensive and predatory. Everything is dark glass and blue light. A bar stretches along one wall with bottles arranged like jewelry beneath backlighting. Music pounds through the room so heavily conversation has to happen close, mouths near eats, hands on shoulders, and bodies leaning together whether they mean to or not.
There are celebrities everywhere. Magazine cover famous. People whose faces exist fifty feet tall on buildings in SoHo. Actresses with bored eyes and perfect mouths. Designers and influencers pretending not to scan the room for better looking people. Models clustered together like an alien species pretending to understand Earth’s customs. Everyone is beautiful and pretending not to care.
Natalie immediately reaches for a cigarette out of habit before she remembers they’re inside, and says, “Fuck.”
Shauna snorts. Van leans close enough to be heard over the music. “Try not to look like you’re about to bite someone.”
Natalie glares at them.
“That’s exactly what I mean.”
A server glides past them holding a tray of champagne flutes. Van grabs one, then another, then somehow a third.
Shauna takes one from their hand. “You’re embarrassing.”
“I’m networking.”
“You don’t even know what that means.”
“It means drinking near rich people. I’ve been to these things with Tai.”
Natalie takes the third glass from Van even though she doesn’t want it, mostly because holding something gives her hands a reason to exist. The champagne tastes crisp and ridiculous. Like money and something too clean to belong in her mouth after singing for ninety minutes in a room full of sweat.
She’s halfway through deciding whether she can hide in the bathroom for twenty minutes when Van goes still beside her. “Oh,” they say, voice changing immediately. “Oh, this is much worse than I thought.”
Natalie follows their gaze. Across the room, near a velvet seating area half hidden, stands Lottie Matthews. Everybody knows who Lottie Matthews is. You can hate fashion and still know that face. It’s on billboards, magazine covers, perfume campaigns, and jewelry ads. She has the kind of face that makes people go quiet for a second before they remember they’re supposed to act normal.
In person, it’s worse. Lottie stands with a glass in one hand, dressed in black satin that looks simple until the lights hits it and makes every line of her body look intentional. Her hair falls loose around her shoulders, dark and glossy. She looks effortless. Like everyone else here had to try and become beautiful and she just woke up cursed with it.
Someone speaks into her ear. Lottie smiles at whatever they say, one hand touching their forearm lightly. It’s intimate enough to make the person lean closer. Detached enough that Natalie can tell, even from across the room, that it doesn’t mean a damn thing.
Van makes a small, delighted sound. Natalie doesn’t look away fast enough. “Don’t,” she says.
“I haven’t said a thing.”
“You’re thinking loudly.”
Shauna shifts beside them, following their line of sight. “Oh. That’s Lottie Matthews.”
“Yeah,” Natalie says flatly. “No shit, Sherlock.”
Van leans toward Shauna. “She’s the one from the Victoria’s Secret thing.”
Natalie exhales hard through her nose. “She was not at the show.”
“She was at the show.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Someone literally told us that.”
“Someone also told us there’d be snacks backstage and there were six olives and a warm LaCroix.”
Shauna takes a sip of her champagne, eyes still on Lottie. “She’s looking this way.”
Natalie’s stomach drops. She knows she should look away. Instead, like an idiot, she looks back at her. Lottie is watching her. Not openly at first. Her body is still angled toward the woman talking beside her. Her expression composed, mouth curved faintly like she’s listening.
But her eyes are on Natalie. Natalie feels it like a hand closing around the back of her neck. For one second, the club seems to narrow around them. The music keeps pounding and people keep laughing. But Natalie registers almost none of it, because Lottie Matthews is looking at her like she recognizes her.
Which is stupid because they’ve never met. Natalie knows that. But there’s something in Lottie’s face that makes recognition feel possible anyway.
Lottie’s gaze drops briefly to take in Natalie’s leather jacket, the smudged makeup, and the rings on her fingers where they curl around the champagne glass. Then her eyes come back up slowly and Natalie’s pulse kicks up.
Lottie’s mouth shifts into something that’s not quite a smile. It’s amused and curious like Natalie is a problem she hasn’t decided whether she wants to solve or make worse.
Natalie looks away first.
Van immediately says, “Oh, you’re so fucked.”
Natalie turns on them. “Shut up.”
“You looked away first.”
“That doesn’t mean anything."
“That means everything, actually.”
Shauna, because she’s secretly evil beneath all that deadpan restraint, adds, “It was kind of intense.”
Natalie looks at her. “Don’t you start.”
“I’m just observing.”
“Well observe something else.”
Van grins into their champagne. “I’m observing sexual tension.”
Natalie rolls her eyes and starts walking toward the bar before either of them can keep talking. The bar is crowded enough that getting there requires shoulder checking through a cluster of people. Natalie mutters apologies she doesn’t mean while slipping between designer suits and silk dresses, painfully aware of how out of place she looks among them.
That’s the thing Van was right about, unfortunately. Not belonging here makes her visible.
The bartender sees her and lights up. “Oh shit,” he says, leaning closer over the bar. “You’re Natalie Scatorccio, right?”
Natalie pauses, thrown off for the second time tonight. “Depends who’s asking.”
He laughs. “Your show was insane. My girlfriend’s obsessed with your band.”
That softens Natalie’s demeanor immediately. “Oh. Thanks.”
“She cried during ‘Static Hymn.’”
Natalie winces slightly. “Sorry?”
“No, she loved it.”
“That’s somehow worse.”
He laughs again and pours her whiskey without asking what she wants. She tips him too much because being recognized still makes her uncomfortable unless she can do something with her hands.
When she turns away from the bar, Lottie is closer. She stands a few feet away now, speaking to some man in an expensive cream suit who is leaning into her space like he’s trying to buy oxygen directly from her mouth. Lottie listens with perfect politeness, head tilted slightly, one hand resting loose around a drink she doesn’t seem to be drinking.
Natalie shouldn’t watch, but she can’t look away. The man says something that makes Lottie smile. It isn’t real. Natalie knows that instantly, which pisses her off because she has no reason to know anything about Lottie’s real smiles.
The man touches Lottie’s waist lightly. Natalie’s grip tightens around her glass before she can think better of it. Lottie doesn’t move away, but she also doesn’t move closer. The whole thing is so controlled it makes Natalie’s skin itch.
The Lottie glances sideways and catches her watching again. Natalie doesn’t look away this time. Lottie’s expression changes by almost nothing. Her brow lifts faintly in a silent question.
Natalie raises her whiskey in a lazy, mocking little toast. Lottie’s mouth curves and this smile is closer to real. Then someone steps between them and the moment breaks. Natalie exhales like she’s annoyed and not like she forgot how to breathe.
“Having fun?” Shauna appears beside her at the bar, somehow quieter than anyone has the right to be in a room this loud.
Natalie takes a drink. “No.”
“You’re staring at the supermodel.”
“I’m looking around.”
“You’re looking around at one person?”
Natalie gives her a flat look. “Do you want something?”
Shauna’s gaze shifts over Natalie’s shoulder and something in her face changes so quickly Natalie almost misses it. Her eyes widen a fraction and her mouth presses together like she’s trying not to react.
Natalie follows her gaze and watches as Jackie Taylor approaches the bar. Natalie knows who she is too. Not as well as Lottie, maybe, but Jackie is everywhere if you pay even minimal attention to luxury campaigns. Tiffany ads. Red carpers. Magazine covers where she looks like old money learned how to smirk.
In person, she is aggressively pretty in a way that almost feels rude. She moves through the room like she expects it to rearrange itself for her, and the worst part is that it does.
“Hi,” Jackie says, stopping in front of them with a smile aimed directly at Shauna. “You’re in the band, right?”
Shauna, who once told a Grammy nominated producer his feedback sounded like something generated by a dying algorithm, says absolutely nothing for a long second. Natalie’s eyebrows immediately shoot up.
Shauna recovers fast, but not fast enough. “Yeah,” she says. “Bass.”
Jackie’s smile brightens. “I thought so. You were really good.”
Shauna takes a sip of champagne like she doesn’t care. “Thanks.”
“I’m Jackie.”
“I know.”
Jackie laughs, delighted instead of offended. “Do you?”
“Everybody knows.”
“Good.” Jackie leans one elbow slightly against the bar. “Saves me from introducing myself properly.”
Natalie stares between them. Oh. Oh, this is going to be horrible.
Shauna looks calm on the outside, but Natalie has known her since high school. She knows the signs. The slight tension in her jaw and the way her fingers tighten around the stem of her glass.
Jackie notices too. That’s probably the problem.
Across the room, Van spots the interaction and nearly lights up like a Christmas tree. They appear at Natalie’s side a second later, vibrating with joy. “Hi,” Van says brightly. “I’m Van. I’ve heard nothing about you because Shauna is very private and emotionally unavailable.”
Shauna turns her head slowly. “I will kill you.”
Jackie looks between them, amused. “Noted.”
Natalie grabs Van by the sleeve and pulls them back a step. “Stop terrorizing people.”
“I’m building community.”
“You’re creating problems.”
“That’s community.”
Jackie laughs again, but her attention slides almost immediately back to Shauna. Natalie watches it happen with dawning horror and delight. Shauna is fucked. Absolutely fucked.
Before Natalie can enjoy that properly, the energy of the room changes. Tai walks in like she’s late to a senate hearing instead of a party. She’s in a sharp black suit. Her posture perfect and expression already unimpressed. She moves with the kind of controlled authority that makes people straighten up without knowing why.
Van sees her first and immediately forgets every other form of entertainment in the room. “Baby,” Van says, stupidly bright, already crossing toward her.
Tai catches them with one arm when Van reaches her, expression softening despite her obvious attempt not to let it. “You’re drunk.”
“I’m socially enriched.”
“You smell like beer.”
“That’s my perfume.”
Tai kisses them anyway, quick and familiar. Natalie looks away because watching happy couples be functional always feels vaguely accusatory. Tai, unfortunately, looks right at her a moment later. Then past her toward Lottie and then back to Natalie. Natalie can practically see the conclusion forming behind her eyes.
“No,” Natalie says before Tai can speak.
Tai lifts one brow. “I didn’t say anything.”
“You were about to.”
“I was observing.”
“Why is everyone observing tonight?”
“Becaue you’re all being obvious,” Tai says.
Van gasps happily. “See? Thank you.”
Natalie drinks half her whiskey in one go.
The party keeps moving around them and the hours seem to stretch strangely inside the club. The music doesn’t get quieter and the drinks don’t stop. People keep touching her arm when they recognize her, leaning in to say the show was incredible, asking for photos, asking when the album is coming, and if the lyrics mean what they think they mean.
Natalie handles it badly but not rudely. She signs someone’s phone case. Takes two blurry selfies. She pretends not to notice when three girls near the hallway whisper and point before one of them finally works up the nerve to tell her she changed her life.
That one makes Natalie look down. “Don’t say that,” she says, too softly to be cool.
The girl laughs nervously. “Sorry.”
“No, I mean–” Natalie rubs at the back of her neck. “Thanks. Just. That’s a lot of responsibility.”
The girl smiles at her like that answer means more than Natalie intended.
When Natalie looks up afterward, Lottie is watching from across the room again. This time there is no amusement in her expression. Lottie stands near the edge of the seating area with a drink in one hand and Jackie at her side now. Jackie says something to her, but Lottie doesn’t look away from Natalie right away.
Natalie suddenly understands, with startling clarity, how people lose their minds over being looked at by Lottie Matthews. It isn’t just because she’s beautiful. It’s because for the time she’s looking at you, it feels like everything else the room has become less interesting.
Natalie turns away first again, jaw tight. She hears Van laugh from somewhere behind her. “Don’t start.”
Van laughs as Natalie pushes through the room toward the rooftop access before she has to endure any more of this. The hallway leading there is narrow and crowded, full of people pressed closely together. The noise dulls slightly as she moves away from the main room.
Halfway down the hall, someone steps out from the seating area at the exact same time. They nearly collide. Natalie stops short and so does Lottie. For one second, they are close enough that Natalie can smell her perfume. It’s something expensive, obviously.
Lottie’s shoulder brushes Natalie’s arm, barely. It’s still somehow the most significant thing that has happened all night. Natalie looks up. Lottie is much taller than she expected. Not by much, but enough that Natalie has to tilt her head slightly.
Up close, Lottie looks less untouchable and more dangerous. The perfection is still there. The cheekbones, mouth, and impossibly brown eyes. But there are tiny cracks too. A tiredness beneath her makeup. A loose strand of hair caught against her lower lip.
Natalie notices all of it before she can stop herself. Lottie notices her noticing.
“Sorry,” someone behind Natalie says, trying to squeeze past them.
Natalie steps sideways at the same time Lottie does. They move in the same direction before pausing and doing it again. For a second, they just stare at each other while people push around them.
Then Lottie laughs. A small, real sound that catches Natalie completely off guard. It changes her face into something softer, warmer.
Natalie feels her own mouth twitch before she can stop it. “Jesus,” she mutters.
Lottie’s gaze drops briefly down to her mouth before traveling back up. “After you,” Lottie says.
Her voice is lower than Natalie expects. Smooth, but not delicate. Natalie’s grip tightens around her glass. She should say something normal. Instead, she says, “That sounded fake polite.”
Lottie’s smile deepens by a fraction. “Did it?”
“Yeah.”
“Good ear.”
Natalie lets out a small laugh then someone bumps her shoulder from behind, breaking the space between them. Lottie steps aside first this time, gesturing lightly with her glass toward the hallway.
Natalie moves past her and their arms brush again. She keeps walking toward the rooftop door without looking back. She makes it three steps before she turns around.
Lottie is still watching her. This time, Natalie doesn’t look away. Not until the rooftop door opens behind her and cold air rushes into the hallway, snapping the moment apart.
-
Natalie eventually ends up back at the bar. Mostly because it is the only place in the club where standing looks like a decision.
Van has disappeared somewhere with Tai, probably making out in the hallway like they are not both grown adults with publicists. Shauna is still near the seating area with Jackie, pretending with admirable commitment that she is not in active danger of developing a crush so obvious it can be seen from space.
Which leaves Natalie, mercifully, alone. She leans one elbow against the bar and lets the noise blur around her until it becomes less music than pressure. Blue lights slide across the marble beneath her fingers. People keep moving around her in silk and leather, leaning in close and laughing too loudly.
Natalie drains the last of her whiskey and sets the glass down harder than she means to.
“Another?” the bartender asks.
“Yeah.” Her voice sounds rougher than usual. Still scraped raw from the show.
The bartender turns away and Natalie reaches automatically for the cigarette tucked behind her ear before remembering that she can’t smoke inside. She keeps reaching for something familiar in a room designed to make her feel like everything she is has been dragged under a spotlight and priced incorrectly. She rolls the cigarette between her fingers anyway.
Then, beside her, a voice says, “You look disappointed to be invited here.”
Natalie doesn’t turn right away. She knows who it is. She can feel Lottie before she looks at her. Or not feel exactly. That sounds stupidly dramatic. Like something Van would say just to piss her off. But the air changes somehow, sharpening against her will around the fact that Lottie fucking Matthews is standing close enough to be heard over the music.
Natalie finally turns her head. Lottie’s leaning against the bar beside her like she’s never had to wonder if she belongs somewhere. One hip against the marble and one hand curled loosely around a glass she once again doesn’t seem interested in drinking.
“I am,” Natalie says.
Lottie’s mouth curves slightly. “That honest?”
“That disappointed.”
The bartender returns with Natalie’s whiskey and glances at Lottie with immediate recognition. “Can I get you anything, Ms. Matthews?”
Natalie’s eyebrow lifts before she can stop it.
Lottie notices. “I’m fine,” Lottie says without looking away from Natalie.
The bartender disappears again.
Natalie lifts her glass. “Ms. Matthews.”
“Don’t start.”
“Oh, I’m starting.”
Lottie angles her body a little more toward her. Enough that the conversation becomes deliberate.
“You don’t like being called by your name?” Natalie asks.
“I like it fine from people who aren’t trying to make fun of me.”
“Bold assumption.”
“An accurate one.”
Natalie takes a sip of whiskey to hide the fact that she almost smiles. Lottie’s gaze drops to the glass, then to Natalie’s mouth, before traveling back to her eyes. The movement quick enough that maybe someone else would miss it.
Natalie feels it like heat under her skin. “So,” Natalie says, because the silence suddenly feels too loaded. “Do you do this a lot?”
Lottie tilts her head. “Approach disappointed musicians at bars?”
“Stand around looking expensive while everyone pretends not to stare at you.”
Amusement, or maybe surprise, flickers across Lottie’s face. “It’s been know to happen.”
“Sounds exhausting.”
“It is.”
The answer comes too fast and too honest. Natalie looks at her more carefully then, because she expected a joke. Some polished little deflection or rich girl bullshit about pretty girl problems. Instead, Lottie looks back, steady and almost bored by her own honesty. That’s the first thing Lottie likes about her.
Lottie’s eyes narrow faintly, like she can tell. “You expected me to say something else.”
“I expected you to lie better.”
Lottie laughs, low and real. It changes her face so completely that Natalie almost forgets what she was going to say next. Lottie smiling politely is beautiful. This is so much worse. Natalie stares at her for too long.
Lottie notices and the amusement in her eyes sharpens. “There it is,” she says.
Natalie immediately scowls. “There what is?”
“You looking like you regret finding me funny.”
“I don’t regret shit.”
“That’s obviously not true.”
“You don’t know anything about me.”
“No,” Lottie says. “But I’m curious.” Lottie says it plainly. Like she means it.
Natalie shifts her weight against the bar. “That your thing?”
“What?”
“Curiosity.”
Lottie’s gaze stays steady. “Sometimes.”
“And the other times?”
“Boredom.”
Natalie huffs a laugh. “Jesus.”
“You asked.”
“Are you always this charming?”
“Usually more.”
“How tragic.”
Lottie smiles again, smaller this time.
The music changes overhead, the bass dropping into something heavier until the bar vibrates under Natalie’s forearm. Someone behind them shrieks with laughter and a group of models presses closer to order drinks, forcing Lottie a step closer.
Lottie leans impossibly closer to be heard. “You were good tonight.”
Natalie looks down at her glass. “You were there?”
“I was.”
“Thought that was a rumor.”
“Disappointing?”
“Depends.”
“On?”
Natalie looks back at her. “Whether you liked it.”
Lottie studies her for a second and the silence between them changes. “I did,” she eventually says.
Natalie’s mouth goes dry. She looks away first because the alternative feels like losing something. “Good for you.”
Lottie hums softly. “That’s one way to accept a compliment.”
“I didn’t ask for one.”
“No,” Lottie says. “That’s probably why I gave it to you.”
Natalie looks back at her. There’s something sharp under all that beauty. Something dry, observant, and almost mean when it wants to be. It makes the whole untouchable supermodel thing suddenly less boring and more dangerous.
“I thought models were supposed to be vapid,” Natalie says.
Lottie’s brow lifts. “You thought that?”
“Obviously.”
“Brave thing to admit to one.”
“I’m known for my courage.”
“Is that what they call it?”
Natalie’s lips twitch. Lottie notices it and looks pleased in a way she tries to hide.
The bartender places a new drink near Lottie without her asking. Some pale cocktail in a glass to delicate to survive Natalie’s life. Lottie glances at it, then ignores it. Natalie reaches behind her ear for the cigarette again without thinking.
Lottie’s gaze follows the motion. “You know you can’t smoke in here.”
“Yeah, I keep remembering. It’s devastating every time.”
“I have a lighter.”
Natalie pauses and then slowly turns her head. Lottie reaches into a tiny black bag that looks too small to hold anything useful and produces a slim gold lighter.
Natalie stares at it. “That’s the most rich person lighter I’ve ever seen.”
“It was gift.”
“From who? The concept of generational wealth?”
This time Lottie’s laugh is quieter. She holds out the lighter and Natalie takes it. Their fingers brush. Just the side of Natalie’s index finger against Lottie’s knuckle. So brief Natalie could pretend it doesn’t register at all if her body weren’t such a traitorous fucking idiot about it.
The lighter is warm from Lottie’s hand. Natalie looks down at it like that’s a safer place to put her attention. The thing is heavy, gold, and engraved with initials that are not Lottie’s.
“You collect gifts from strangers?” Natalie asks.
“Only useful ones.”
“That include people?”
Lottie’s expression shifts into something interested. “There’s the question.”
Natalie’s pulse picks up. She shouldn’t have said that. Maybe this whole conversation has been waiting for one them to stop being cute about it.
Lottie leans closer, just enough that her voice drops beneath the music. “Are you asking if I use people, Natalie?”
Her name in Lottie’s mouth is a problem. She immediately likes it. She drags her thumb over the lighter’s smooth edge. “I’m asking if you get bored.”
Lottie looks at her for a long moment. “Usually,” she says.
Natalie feels something unpleasantly close to satisfaction. “And tonight?”
Lottie’s gaze drops to Natalie’s mouth for the second time. Then back up. “Not yet.”
The words are simple but Natalie feels them low in her stomach anyway. She should say something that puts them back where they starteed, with enough distance between them that this doesn’t become whatever the fuck it’s already trying to become.
Instead, she laughs under her breath. “You’re kind of a nightmare.”
Lottie smiles. “Only kind of?”
“Don’t push your luck.”
“I thought you were known for courage.”
“I lied.”
“I know.”
Natalie should not like any of this.
Lottie’s eyes flick down to the cigarette still between Natalie’s fingers. “Were you planning to just hold that all night?”
“I’m grieving.”
“About the smoking ban?”
“About society.”
“Very rockstar of you.”
Natalie rolls her eyes, but when Lottie reaches for the lighter, she gives it back. Their fingers brush for a second time. This time, Lottie doesn’t immediately pull away. Neither does Natalie. It lasts for maybe a second. Then Lottie’s thumb shifts lightly against Natalie’s wrist as she takes the lighter. Natalie feels the contact all the way up her arm.
Her expression must change, because Lottie notices. The corner of Lottie’s mouth curves as Natalie leans slightly closer, annoyed into honesty. “You always look at people like that?”
“Like what?”
“Like you already know what they’re thinking?”
“I don’t.”
“No?”
“No.” Lottie’s voice is smooth, but her eyes stay too fixed. “Sometimes I’m guessing.”
“And what are you guessing about me?”
Lottie holds her gaze for a beat too long. “That you hate how much you’re enjoying this conversation.”
Natalie feels her jaw tighten. Bullseye. She takes a drink to buy herself a second and immediately hates how pleased Lottie looks about it. “You’re very confident.”
“I’m usually right.”
“That sounds exhausting too.”
“It is.”
Lottie Matthews is not what she expected. She expected beautiful, aloof, rich, and probably boring in the way people who are used to being wanted often are. She didn’t expect dry humor, sharp eyes, and a kind of tiredness underneath the glamour that Natalie recognizes.
Before she can say anything about it, a hand lands on her shoulder.
“Natalie.” Their manager, Ben, appears beside her looking flushed and frantic. “There you are. Rolling Stone wants five minutes. Right now.”
Natalie doesn’t move. She keeps looking at Lottie. For one absurd second, she considers saying no. To Rolling Stone and the man that has spent the last year begging anyone with a press badge to care about their band.
All because Lottie Matthews is standing in front of her with a gold lighter in her hand and a real smile still fading from her mouth.
Ben squeezes her shoulder. “Nat.”
She exhales hard through her nose and looks away first. Again. “Yeah. Fine.”
Lottie’s expression smooths back into something almost polite, but Natalie catches a flicker of frustration before it disappears.
Good. At least she’s not the only one. Natalie takes one step back from the bar and pauses. She looks at Lottie.
“Try not to die of boredom without me.”
Lottie’s eyes brighten.
“No promises.”