3 Can I Stay.
The lights flashed continuously, and in such a constant and unrelenting way that the usually pitch black, dirty street was lit up like Rodeo Drive. Tens of cars, expensive or clunkers, lined the thin street and stretched down the length of it, until they spilled out into the next road over. Spencer titled her head down and pushed her chin into her chest in an attempt to cut out some of the blinding light, an attempt that wasn't working well- or at all. There must have been hundreds of photographers, all of them equipped with the newest and best cameras, all of them clicking away without care or skill. All desperate for one photo of Spencer Carlin.
Spencer Carlin in handcuffs.
The police officer put a gentle hand on her shoulder and pushed her down into the car, trying to sheild her from the paparazzi the best he could.
"Just a couple miles, ma'am." He spoke into her ear, comforting in such a twirl of frenzied action. He shut the door and cut some of the sound. Spencer leant down into the seat- it smelled like sick and sweat and jail and she wanted to cry but she refused to give anyone the satisfaction. So, instead, she sat up and forced herself to employ some of that grace and poise her mother had pounded into her from day one.
She shot her gaze out the window in a calm, settled look meant for the paparazzi and them only, and then glanced away. She desperately tried to ignore them and focuse on the whine of the siren and the rumble of the engine that could barely be heard over the screams of her name.
It was a cutting facade.
Maybe the best one she had ever put on, but one nonetheless. Inside, all she wanted to do was cry, because she was terrified and dazed and she couldn't remember what had happened in the last hour. She was bleeding and kind of dirty and her ears were ringing. She was so thankful for the speeding car she was in and its flashing lights and loud siren.
She was sort of drunk.
She remembered dinner, and drinking with her older brothers while her little siblings danced around with water guns. She remembered going to party with Glen, and she remembered a concert, and then the beginning of an afterparty. But all of that was kind of blurred and the last part was mostly gone. She rememebered hands and bodies and the smell of human closeness, but that was something she had grown so used to that she didn't even bother to distinguish it from all the other clumps of memory.
She remembered other hands to.
Ones that weren't brushing her with casual intimacy or accidental movement, but that grazed her with fierce purpose and twined their way through her already tangled hair. Ones that knew the skin they were handling so roughly, because if they hadn't they wouldn't have dared touch her like that. They wouldn't have had a reason to. She had tiny bruises and aches and scratches but the events, the probably passionate actions, were wiped away.
They screeched to a halt in front of the police station and all of that noise, all the overly bright lights and rough hands and callous voices, all came running back into her ears, washing over her body. The door was flung open, another policeman, his eyes barely glancing her way, motioned for her to get out. To step into the fray of squirming bodies all brandishing something at her, all waving things obnoxiously in her face, lights popping.
But she stepped out anyway, because she knew she had to and she wasn't a patient person- even when it came to pain. Her face was like stone, like a flawless carving by someone very fucked up, because she was so gorgeous and so flat. She was every bit of the girl next door and that was it- no underlying emotions, no secrets to hold. She was America's sweetheart, or maybe just the mask of it.
Nobody cared.
Three bodyguards, five policemen, and two lawyers weren't enough to keep the crowd back. A hand hit her cheek, a camera glanced off her shoulder, and then it was over and she was inside. But she wasn't any safer- wasn't any more relaxed. The yellow lights and white tiles made her face even colder, her eyes even darker and maybe even glassier. The reflections of camera flashes and muted voices made her chest clench. Her lawyer- Jake or something, she had probably fucked him once - placed a hand on her shoulder and guided her toward a steel room. Or, it looked steel, and cold and harsh. Everything she felt right now.
They fingerprinted her, made her sign stuff she couldn't even read her eyes were swimming so, and took her picture. Made her stand there holding a black, flimsy feeling square with numbers on it- her numbers- like she was a criminal.
She wasn't.
She saw her picture in the monitor when she walked past. She looked angry but cold, defiant but calm, and most of all, she looked hot. Even with a red spot growing on her cheek and her hair pulled up behind her head, dirt smearing her neck, she looked hot. Maybe not beautiful, or elegantly gorgeous, but she was fucking hot.
They brought her to another room, almost an hour later, and this one smelled like sweat and metal. She wasn't so drunk anymore, wasn't removed from everything in a self-induced haze of alcohol and cocaine. So she saw the anger in her mother's eyes and the disappointment in her father's; the sympathy in Glen's and the confusion in Clay's. The reactions she had been expecting- she had imagined them over in her head while she was sweating under the hot lights, having her picture taken while she was half-drunk. But she hadn't been expecting the slap. The one that glanced off her face, her mother's soft hand turning unexplainably hard and unforgiving.
Her hand reflecting her personality for once.
They left after that. Left Spencer in another steel room with a man she might have fucked once. She sat down at the table and the police came in soon after, shooting questions before they were even in the room.
"Where were you at 2:15 this morning?"
"Did you ever have sexual relations with Matthew Ingram?"
"Was it consensual?"
"How many drugs are you on, sugar?"
"How old were you when you started using?"
"Do you have a violent nature?"
"Does she have a violent nature?"
"Did you kill Matthew Ingram?"
Spencer lied a lot. She had been lying all her life and she didn't see why she should stop now. Money could buy anything, even this Hollywood police department, and she had money. She had plenty of money. She could afford to lie a lot.
Hours passed. Long, confusing hours, and they asked questions that didn't even matter, ones that she sometimes couldn't even reply to, because the answers had no value whatsoever. They hadn't ever meant anything, so why were these people asking them? Standing with one foot on the chair, showing off shiny metal guns as if that would make her nervous. As if she hadn't ever seen one before, hadn't ever been threatened by one.
She had.
Eventually, the questions slowed. Hours passed and the policewoman rubbed at her eyes, and her partner flipped numbly through his notes. Spencer's posture hadn't slipped once- nor had her facial expression. It stayed cold and unemotional and her voice factual and icy. She was pissed and confused and better at displaying cold emotions. Better at putting on facades, because after all she got paid millions to do it didn't she?
There was the quick opening of the door, hurried words and her lawyer- his name was Mark -stood up to join the talk. His hands moved with his words, painting pictures of distress and frantic. She read body language too well, read subtle signs and quick movements without ever really realizing it. These said he was tired. That he was close to losing it. They said he wanted to be home and he was getting irritated with her. He met her gaze for a millisecond and his eyes guiltily echoed his hands.
But more men in suits came in, their faces blurring together. Spencer was fucking tired. She wanted a soft bed and a hot bath. Fuck she wanted her home. She stood up, smoothed out her clothes. Tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. Was aware of every eye turning toward her, every word halted. She pretended to study them, really just gathered her wits, and spoke. A smile hinted though she couldn't feel it whatsoever.
"I think we're done here." And the determined husk in her voice cut into the mumurs of the station. No one spoke. She stepped around the cold table, steady and confident. Passed by each detective and cop without an ounce of hestitation. Her lawyer followed her out.
"We'll be calling you Ms. Carlin!" She didn't respond.
She went straight through the waiting room. Barely even heard the racous calls and vulgar words. Mark-Jake sputtering into a phone behind her, spitting orders and directions. She stepped outside and hurried through the throng. Didn't notice the limo ride or the trip to her room- couldn't remember it if she wanted to.
She fell asleep the second she touched the bed, after stripping every piece of clothing off. Throwing it into the living room. Her eyes shut tight and dreams of loud music and frantic hands, all over her and dancing before her. Dreamt of pale faces and glaring lights. Of drunken words and steel tables.
Dreamt of the night that changed it all.
Sometimes, she still dreams like that.