Chapter 10: Live on TV
Summer stood on the porch of 837 Holburn Lane just a few minutes later, her hands trembling and her heart pounding. Taking a deep breath, she reached out and shakily pressed the doorbell before taking a step back.
After a few seconds, the door opened, and there stood a man in his late thirties with greying light hair and an unshaved face. "Can I help you?" he asked Summer, looking confusedly at her.
"Um…" Summer looked down as she fiddled with her fingers. "Uh…is there someone here named Sean Bowen?" she asked.
"That's me; what do you want?" he asked.
"Er…" Summer bit her lip nervously. "My name is Summer Bowen, and my mom's name is Amber French. Um…you guys had me in high school, so…yeah, I'm…I'm your daughter, I guess."
The man's face changed. "Summer?" he murmured.
"Dad…"
Reaching out to put a hand on Summer's shoulder, he looked her up and down. "Jesus Christ, you look so much like your mom," he said softly. Summer laughed a little, and although she didn't cry, she still felt a lump come into her throat as her dad pulled her into a hug.
"So, what happened to you and Mom after you put me up for adoption?" Summer asked her dad. She was sitting with him and his two pet dogs (affectionately named Axl and Slash after two of the Guns 'n' Roses musicians, he'd told her) in his living room, and they were getting reconnected.
"We kept dating until the end of high school after you were born," he answered, "although things were always a little more awkward between us, what with knowing that somewhere out there was a kid who was ours but wasn't really ours anymore. We parted ways after graduating, 'cause I came out here to go to college, and we eventually lost touch."
"Sorry to hear it," Summer murmured sympathetically.
"It's alright. I've dated off and on since then – but nothing too serious. I know your mom would've been thrilled to meet you."
"I'm sure," Summer answered thoughtfully. "Who knows? I've already found you; maybe I'll reconnect with her at some point, too."
"So, what about you?" her dad asked. "How's life been treating you? Did you end up with a good family?"
"Well, um…" Summer looked down at her hands in her lap, a little more sober. "In short…no. Basically, my adoptive family got pretty abusive, and their kids had some serious shit going on, too, so I became a foster kid. Was in and out of the system for the rest of my childhood; I'd rather not go into the full story right now."
Summer's dad looked pale. "Summer, I'm so sorry," he said quietly. "Damn, if I'd known that that would've happened, I would've persuaded your mom to keep you so we could raise you together!"
"It's fine," Summer reassured him. "How could you know what would've happened? To be honest, though, my foster families weren't great, either: they only really cared about the money involved."
"All the same, though, I'm so, so sorry," her dad said. Seeing that Summer didn't want to talk about it anymore, he added, "But enough about the past; what kind of stuff are you up to now?"
"Oh, tons of stuff," Summer replied, brightening. "I'm actually starting a career in music!"
"Really? That's great! How's that going?"
"It's going really well; do you know who I mean when I mention a band called the Holograms?"
Summer's dad thought for a moment. "Oh, wait a minute…I remember your mom being a big fan of them back when we were in high school!"
Summer's eyebrows went up. "Mom was a fan of the Holograms?!"
"Yeah – well, she loved all music, really; seems like you got your love of music from her, as well as your looks!"
Summer grinned as she proceeded to explain to her dad how she and Jerrica had met (although she changed a few of the details, saying that she had been singing on karaoke night at a restaurant she worked at rather than performing onstage at a nightclub), how she'd gone on tour with the Holograms, and how she'd been signed on to Alliance Records and had almost completed her debut album.
"I'm happy for you, Summer," her dad told her when she'd finished her story. "That's amazing that you're gettin' ahead so early on in life." Just then, the two of them heard the dogs scratching at the front door. "Sounds like the boys need to get out of the house," he laughed. "You want to help me get their leashes on and go out for a while?"
"Sure," Summer answered. "I'll just run over next door to let Jerrica and Aja know where I am, but yeah – sounds good, Dad!"
And so, Summer and her dad spent pretty much the rest of the afternoon walking the dogs, eating ice cream, and talking some more. Summer told her dad more of her story and he told her more about her mom, and it was a good afternoon all around. They also traded numbers and promised to keep in touch once Summer and Jerrica had both headed back to LA, which they did early in the evening.
Two weeks later
Back in LA, the last few songs for Summer Bowen's debut album had been recorded, and a few days later, her very first album, Just by Chance, had become known to the world. And as soon as it was found out that "the girl from that viral Holograms video" had put out some music of her own, the album sales skyrocketed through the roof, and the songs themselves went viral all over the internet. In just a couple of weeks, Summer had gone from mostly anonymous to in the top five on the Billboard Hot 100. An enormous billboard advertising her album had also been set up across the street from Starlight Mansion; if anyone ever looked out the front window from the second floor, they would instantly see Summer's face staring back at them from the billboard.
At the moment, Jerrica was sitting in the living room with Devon and Latrell, who'd driven out from San Diego to see Summer for the first time since she went on the Holograms' tour. "A lot of reporters waiting to see her downstairs?" Jerrica asked him.
"Yeah," he answered.
"She'd better come out soon, before they leave," Jerrica went on – to which Latrell asked, "You want me to go check on her?"
"We're gonna have to get going pretty soon, so sure," Jerrica answered. With that, Latrell got up and headed to Summer's room, knocking on her door once he reached it. "Summer?" he called softly.
No answer.
Starting to open the door slowly, Latrell added, "I'm comin' in now…"
Still no answer.
As Latrell opened the door all the way and came into the room, he found Summer lying on her bed, her now platinum-blonde hair (which had been bleached since the cover photos for her album had been taken) spread out around her face.
"What's goin' on, girl?" he asked.
When Summer spoke, her voice came out almost sounding like a whimper. "This is so weird," she answered quietly – although she wasn't really replying to Latrell at all. "I don't know who the hell I think I am, like, to put out one song is fine, but to put out a whole album, I mean, I don't know what the fuck I was thinking."
Latrell sat down on the edge of the bed by Summer's feet. "I wouldn't know about that, but I gotta say, you certainly do look like a star," he told her.
Summer sat up, feeling a little more encouraged by his words. "Really?"
"Yeah."
Summer smiled at him. Pulling out his phone, Latrell showed her a video that her three former roommates had taken and sent to him to show Summer when they'd found out he was going to visit her in LA. They all gave her their congratulations and complimented her new album, with Hafsa even holding up a CD copy she'd bought for them to listen to in the car, and they said they hoped she'd come back out to San Diego to visit soon.
"What do you think of her new look, like the hair and the…whatever…?" Jerrica asked Devon.
"I discussed it with her, and…"
"Yeah?"
"Yeah, I think she looks really good."
"Was the platinum blonde thing your choice, or…"
"She actually wanted to go with neon pink originally, but I said no, that would be a little wild for just starting out, so she decided to go with platinum for the time being. No drink, I see?"
"What was that?"
"You haven't got a drink?" Devon repeated a bit louder. Pausing only for a beat, Jerrica quipped back, "You haven't got socks?"
Devon laughed, glancing down at his feet. "Touché, Ms. Benton. Touché."
"I mean, when you wear high heels, you never wear socks with those, but with literally any other kind of shoe, I could never get used to the idea of not wearing socks, y'know, your feet get all…"
"I actually am wearing socks," Devon explained, pulling one of them up over the edge of his shoe. "They're like these tiny little insert socks that just work really well with these shoes."
"Oh, so you are wearing socks, but you're just hiding them or whatever!"
"Yeah, I'm just hiding them, that's right," Devon answered, laughing again. Just then, Summer and Latrell came back out into the living room together, Latrell announcing, "The queen is here!"
"Stop!" Summer giggled, giving him a teasing slap on the shoulder. Getting up from the couch, Devon told Summer, "Got a new gig for you: how does doing the musical performance on The Chat Show with Paul Richardson sound?"
"Did you get it?" Summer asked, her eyes widening. Confirming her question, Devon answered, "No, you got it!"
"No fucking way!" Latrell stared at Summer, open-mouthed – who didn't even hear him as she let out an excited scream of "No way! Oh, my GOD! That's incredible – thank you!"
"Congratulations," Devon told Summer as she turned to hug Latrell, who was still cheering almost as excitedly as herself. Cutting in quickly, Devon added, "We gotta get downstairs and head to Alliance Records; rehearsals for your Chat Show bit start today and there's a bunch of reporters wanting to speak to you before you go."
"Okay." Summer started to follow Devon out of the room, but Jerrica cut in quickly, "Hey, can I just talk to her outside for a second? Just one sec, that's all – be right back."
With that, Jerrica headed upstairs with Summer following close behind her, wondering what on earth Jerrica could want to talk to her about. Just then, they reached the top of the stairs and Jerrica headed towards the large second-floor window that gave them the perfect view of Summer's billboard right across the street.
Summer sighed with a feeling of pride and accomplishment as she gazed out the window at the image of her face; Jerrica added, "It doesn't do you justice, I'll tell you that."
"Really?" Summer asked, turning around.
"Yeah, those other record guys were wrong about your looks; you're gonna be a real catch for some guy someday, maybe some young heartthrob singer or some boy-band member –"
Summer burst out laughing. "Are you fucking serious?" she guffawed.
"Yes, I'm fucking serious," Jerrica teased. "I remember thinking Latrell was a lucky guy before I found out you were just friends…who knows, maybe you'd even get Brett Pacheco's attention at some point…?"
"Oh, God, we're just friends, too!" Summer laughed. "Besides, I don't even know him very well, I mean, I've hardly seen him in ages…"
"I know, but you guys did hang out a lot on the tour, and I saw the way –"
"That's cuz he was teaching me how to use Synergy!"
"The lady doth protest too much, methinks…"
Summer burst into fresh laughter at Jerrica's teasing. As the two of them sobered down, however, Jerrica added, "I just wanna say this now, before I lose the chance and kick myself forever…"
"Say what?" Summer asked, genuinely curious.
"If you don't dig deep into your heart, you won't have a fucking leg to stand on. Just telling you that right now."
Summer thought she sort of understood what Jerrica was getting at, but she still looked at Jerrica, puzzled.
"I'm just saying, if you don't say whatever it is you want to say in your music, you're fucked," Jerrica went on, as a way of explanation. "All you've really got in the world is yourself and what you wanna tell people – and right now, they're listening, but they won't always be; trust me, the spotlight can be a pretty cruel place that rejects you almost as soon as it shines on you. So, you gotta grab the chance, without apologizing for anything or wondering why anyone's listening or how long they're gonna listen for, and you just gotta tell 'em whatever it is you want 'em to hear." Jerrica looked away from the window and turned her gaze back to Summer. "'Cause the way you say it is honestly the stuff of angels," she added.
Three weeks later, Summer's rehearsals for her Chat Show performance had wrapped up and the day had come. At the studio, crew-members, stage-hands, and technicians were running around, finishing up last-minute jobs before filming began.
"Thirty seconds," one of the crew-members announced, instantly followed by applause. "Red mark. Paul in twenty."
The talk-show host walked up to the stage before filming began. Offstage, a crowd of stage-hands and other people watched the stage – Jerrica among them. Other voices came from the technicians and camera crew:
"Fifteen…"
"Alright, stand by, everyone, here we go – ready? Song one…"
"Stand by, Paul – stand by, Paul…"
"Paul in ten…"
"In ten…nine…eight…seven…six…"
"Ready four…"
"Paul in five seconds…"
"Four…three…two…one…"
"And go four…dissolve four, and cue Paul!" Instantly, the audience applauded. Paul Richardson appeared on camera as he announced, "Alright, ladies and gentlemen, we're back from commercials, which means it's time to introduce our musical guest for the evening!" When the cheering had died down again, he continued, "She's just recently released her very first album and has been garnering tons of attention for it – so without further ado, please welcome one of the hottest new artists on the scene these days: Summer Bowen!"
"Dissolve one," another technician added as Paul Richardson left the stage and the applause grew even louder than before. A moment later, the music began and the spotlight shone on Summer and her dancers (two men and four women), her back facing the audience. At her cue, Summer turned around and started singing.
You all knew how to hypnotize a girl,
You'd play your flute, I'd get up and dance,
But when you've got other issues like
A temper or keepin' it in your pants,
Then things get bad – they're so fucked up,
And the girl's the one pickin' up your slack,
But if she hates herself enough,
Your bitch is still gonna have your back…
Although Summer spent most of the dance routine leading the other dancers she was working with, there were also a few pole-dances included in the performance; this had been incorporated into her routine back during rehearsals when she'd let it slip one time that she knew how to do it. Summer had always hated pole-dancing on Strip Saturdays at the Metropolis, having to strip her clothes off as she danced and blatantly sexualize herself, and collecting the dollar bills those guys threw at her. But honestly, this felt different. As much as she'd hated pole-dancing, she'd been good at it, and it was also pretty good exercise; she also didn't need to act as overtly sexual as she'd done at the Metropolis, but even when she did have to play up her flirty side in this routine, she surprisingly didn't mind so much. Yes, sir, she was actually enjoying pole-dancing for once!
Wearing your princess like a sidepiece,
She looks so cute to show to your chums,
You make them holler and whistle and cheer,
While she sits in the shadows and eats the crumbs…
One, two, three, four,
Five letters I wanna write,
And mail out to each one of you,
Lemme spell it out in black and white;
Each letter's got just two words inside,
But those two words will nicely do;
I wanna mail my letters to you –
Each one just saying "fuck you" …
Jerrica was watching Summer's performance from just offstage along with a few of the stagehands, an unopened can of beer in her hand. It was almost ironic, she thought: when Summer had first come to that concert a few months ago, she'd been the one watching Jerrica from the sidelines before Jerrica had called her onstage – and now Summer was the one out there and Jerrica was watching from the sidelines!
Where's your manners? Didn't Mom tell you
"Be nice to girls"? Did you listen or care?
Dump me, beat me, hurt me, kill me,
Finding a good guy is just too rare;
She stays just to say she has a boyfriend –
Someone wins and someone loses,
The girls are jealous, let it stay that way,
And use foundation to cover your bruises…
Jerrica wandered away from the wings and over to a lounge area where a few more stagehands were watching Summer's performance on a wide-screen TV, and cracked open her beer and took a long drink. It gave her a sense of pride knowing that she was helping this girl make her dreams come true, but she was also a bit jealous of Summer for being the one in the spotlight, and longed for the days when the Holograms had been the next big thing in music.
"She's gotten herself an album and a Chat Show performance now, huh?" asked a voice.
Jerrica turned to see Kimber looking back at her. Walking over to her sister with a crooked grin, Jerrica asked, "What the hell are you doing here?"
"I heard rumours about her performing on The Chat Show, so I made some arrangements and came to check it out," Kimber answered. Changing the subject, she added, "I've got my own condo now, it's pretty nice; I also recently did an opening gig for some new band called Neon Horse, and I swear they're trying to be the real-life version of The Stingers."
Jerrica leaned close to Kimber, making it obvious that she hadn't heard her sister. "I said they're totally ripping off The Stingers," Kimber repeated, raising her voice a notch. "Y'know, one of the bands from our TV show?"
"No shit?" Jerrica replied.
But I've matured, and I've moved on,
I made a choice, and I chose to run,
You snake-charmers can't control me now,
Cuz I'm not a slave to anyone!
One, two, three, four,
Five letters I wanna write,
And mail out to each one of you,
Lemme spell it out in black and white;
Each letter's got just two words inside,
But those two words will nicely do;
I wanna mail my letters to you –
Each one just saying "fuck you" …
"Is it getting worse?" Kimber asked, referring to Jerrica's hearing. Shaking her head, Jerrica lied, "No; I've just been helping Summer out, letting her stay at Starlight Mansion and whatever, and it's going good." Kimber looked like she didn't fully believe Jerrica.
One: you hurt me,
Two: you hurt me,
Three: you hurt me,
Four: you hurt me,
Five: you hurt me –
And that's enough;
I'm moving on
To better stuff!
"Funny you should be here," Jerrica told her, taking another sip of her beer, "'cause I was actually thinking of asking you to come back to the group, especially now that Summer's basically gone."
Kimber hesitated for a long time. She was still following the Holograms on social media, and from things she'd seen and observed, it seemed like Jerrica was doing a little better than she had been before Summer had entered the picture. But she'd already promised that she'd be quitting the band for good this time. And another thing…were things really better with Jerrica? Anybody could lie through their teeth about something, Jerrica being no exception, so it was hard to accurately say.
"I think it would be better if I stayed away," Kimber said finally. Jerrica stared rather blankly at her sister for a moment before she turned to walk away – but Kimber caught her shoulder. "Hey," she added, "if you get into any trouble, though, just call me, okay?"
One, two, three, four,
Five letters I wanna write,
And mail out to each one of you,
Lemme spell it out in black and white;
Each letter's got just two words inside,
But those two words will nicely do;
I wanna mail my letters to you –
Each one just saying "fuck you"!
Towards the end of the final verse, the two male dancers lifted Summer up on their shoulders and she struck a pose as she sang the last words. When the music stopped, the audience instantly went wild. Summer was grinning from ear to ear as her two partners set her down again; waving to the audience, she cried, "Thank you!"
A couple days later, Summer was doing a photoshoot in the studio at Alliance Records. It had been going since earlier that evening, and it was pretty early in the morning now – not that it mattered much, since she was hyped up on a couple of iced coffees. Her hair and makeup had taken a couple hours (she could've had it done up with Synergy holograms, but Devon had insisted that she actually have her hair and makeup done for the photo-shoot), and the shoot itself was taking even longer – especially since she had a ton of her Synergy files lined up and she'd been switching between hologram outfits all evening.
"Yeah, that's it, Summer," one of the photographers was saying as he instructed Summer on how to pose. "Yeah, right there…" Just then, Devon walked into the photo studio, taking a seat to watch the photo shoot.
"Chin up a little, Summer," the photographer continued. "Tilt your head a little more towards me – that's it, love it…"
The photo-shoot finally wrapped up a few minutes later, and Summer slid off the stool she'd been sitting on and headed straight towards the chair she'd left her bag by (picking her third iced coffee of the night up from the seat when she reached the chair). Just then, she saw Devon coming into the studio a few feet away.
"Show's over, Synergy," Summer said, pressing on her earring and making her outfit vanish. As she headed over towards Devon, she called feebly out to him, "Oh, man, it's so early; I've been here pretty much all night!"
"You mean it's early for me and late for you," Devon joked as he got up.
Summer grinned as she gave him a high-five. "Hey, good to see you."
"Good to see you, too; how're you doin'?"
"Well, I'm…I'm pretty tired," Summer admitted as she pulled away, taking a sip of her coffee. "I've ordered three iced coffees in all this time just to stay awake!" She and Devon sat down in front of a computer displaying the photos that had been taken throughout the evening; nodding towards where the photographer sat, Devon said, "He's amazing, isn't he?"
"Yeah, he really is," Summer answered, scrolling through a few of the photos taken earlier that night. "What do you think?"
"They're beautiful; look at that, look at these photos!" Devon pointed to some of the pictures Summer was scrolling through. "That's fucking incredible; look at that!"
"I can't believe I look so good in these pictures; I never thought I could be so photogenic," Summer laughed. "Like, that almost doesn't even look like me! I guess having a professional photographer really makes all the difference, huh?"
"Sure does. By the way, I've got some good news on a couple different counts that you might wanna hear."
"Go on…" Summer took another sip of her coffee.
"One is that I've been looking into getting some tours arranged for you. We're hoping to start off with a tour around the U.S. once you finish up some promotional shows here in LA, then one across all of North America, then a European tour, and then possibly a global one."
"Are you serious?" When Devon nodded, Summer answered, "Oh my God, that's amazing! And what was the other good news?"
Devon didn't answer right away. When he finally spoke, though, he told Summer, "You've just been nominated for three Grammys, including Best New Artist."
Summer choked on the sip of coffee she'd just taken. When she'd recovered, Devon added, "They just announced it now."
As the words got through Summer's skull, she nearly keeled off her chair. Getting up from his own seat, Devon called, "Grammy-nominated artist, everybody!"
Summer rose unsteadily from her chair as she turned to face the crew and technicians, who'd all started applauding. She couldn't say anything, she was still so stunned, and could barely even manage a shaky smile. A couple of the techies patted her on the back and Devon gave her a side-hug, but Summer acknowledged them all a little absentmindedly. She, Summer Bowen, who was only nineteen and still attending college, who'd always dreamed of having a music career and making her story heard, had been nominated for not one, not two, but three Grammys!
She knew this couldn't be real – and yet, it was.
The link to Summer's song: drive dot google dot com/file/d/13ChgCoGX4-21CccqWWCl-81K1eZjfXHC/view?usp=share_link (Also, feel free to assume that any of the language in this new song of Summer's is edited slightly for the TV broadcast, mmkay? Haha! XD)