Page 2 of The Little Things

“What about you, princess? I shared, now it’s your turn.”

“Well, I guess I’m in for breaking and entering. And... maybe a little bit of arson.”

My cellmate’s eyes flared as she leaned forward, the picture of curiosity. “How does someone get popped for a little bit of arson, exactly?”

“It was a small fire,” I defended. “A baby fire, really. It didn’t even burn half the room down, and I got it mostly put out before the police arrived.”

Her mouth dropped open on a laugh of bewilderment. “You’re kidding me. You’re telling me you broke into a place and set it on fire? You? The little princess?” Her ridiculing bark of laughter bounced off the walls and rattled around my skull, making the headache that had been pulsing in my brain and behind my eyeballs that much worse. “No way. I don’t believe it.”

I folded my arms over my chest, holding myself protectively. “It wasn’t like that. It was an accident.”

A huge, incredibly stupid accident that could have been prevented if I could just start making better decisions. But that wasn’t exactly something I was known for doing, and it had finally come back to bite me in the ass. Big time.

If I made smarter choices I would have told my best friend Kendall no when she suggested I throw a party to cheer myself up after not getting picked for that new reality TV dating show I’d auditioned for. I wouldn’t have trusted her when she assured me she had the perfect place to host a rager or that I should post about it all across social media.

I should have listened to my gut when it started screaming at me that something wasn’t right. That Kendall had been lying when she insisted the only reason she had to pick the lock on the front door of the mansion in the hills was because she’d lost the key the homeowner had given her, and that they were totally okay with us inviting over a hundred of our closest friends to swim in their luxurious pool and grotto and help ourselves to the expensive wines in their wine cellar.

But I didn’t do that. I’d shut off that voice of reason and went with the flow just like I always did. Because that was how you stayed on top in the social circles I ran in. Not rocking the boat and being known as the girl who was always up for a good time was the only way to keep from being a social outcast. It was all about who could throw the best party. Who had the most expensive car or penthouse apartment or wardrobe. Who was dating the hottest actor or athlete at any given moment.

Tonight had been one hell of a wakeup call. There wasn’t a single thing of substance to me or any of the people I’d considered my friends. All those so-called friendships had shriveled up and died as soon as we heard the sirens and they all bailed, leaving me holding the bag—and the fire extinguisher—as I tried to snuff out the flames one of those geniuses had started in the kitchen when they wanted to prove they could pull off a fire breathing trick with a mouthful of vodka and a culinary butane torch.

As it turned out, the house belonged to the parents of the guy Kendall had been hooking up with until very recently, when he traded her in for a Brazilian swimsuit model. The B&E and the party that trashed their house was her way of getting revenge. On him for dumping her, and on his folks for convincing their son he could do so much better than a twenty-two-year-old Instagram influencer whose singing career ended before it could begin when someone leaked a version of her single without the autotune.

I’d tried my best to be supportive in her endeavor, lying through my teeth when I assured her the song was going to be a banger in all the clubs across Los Angeles. Not that it would have mattered if I told her the truth. Her gift for fooling herself into believing she excelled at all things was her only real talent.

My cellmate whistled. “Girly, when you do something, you do it big, don’t you?”

She wasn’t wrong about that. But it wasn’t something I was particularly proud of. The truth was, I didn’t really have a reason for all the stupid shit I tended to get myself into. My parents hadn’t mistreated me growing up. They didn’t throw money at me to keep me out of their hair like so many people I knew. They weren’t mean or neglectful or abusive. My parents loved me like crazy, and I had grown up feeling that love every single day.

The problem occurred when I was old enough to realize I had two parents with incredible gifts that the world adored them for. My father was a famous country singer who had managed to cross over into mainstream and become a world-wide icon in the music industry. My mother had started her career as a crazy-talented burlesque dancer at a club in Virginia. She’d grown so popular that she traveled to places like New York and Chicago, Paris and Rome, where she headlined these huge reviews that sold out every single night.

Because Roan and Alma Blackwell were who they were, the world just assumed I would be some sort of a wunderkind, that the talents of my parents would pass down to me, and I’d be the next big thing. The expectations from as far back as I could remember had always rested heavily on my shoulders. My parents never made me feel like they expected greatness—unachievable or otherwise. They never seemed disappointed I hadn’t followed in either of their footsteps, but that didn’t mean I hadn’t felt the pressure from everyone else. I didn’t have my father’s vocal talents. Far from it, in fact. My singing voice sounded like a thousand cats being thrown into a woodchipper. And unlike my mother, I had two left feet. Any time I tried to dance, I would end up tripping over my own feet and seriously hurting myself.

As I grew older, I eventually let that pressure get to me. The bitterness at not being as amazing as they were ate at me until I finally decided to do what a lot of kids and young adults in my situation did. I leaned hard into that whole nepo-baby stigma, surrounding myself with other people who would never live up to the fame or success of their parents.

Take Kendall, for example. Her hotelier father had always hoped she’d go into the family business, but she had been more set on partying and posting all over Instagram and TikTok. Problem was, Daddy tended to have to use his money and connections to dig her out of the holes she dug for herself constantly when she said something insensitive or offensive—which was way more often than should have been acceptable. There was one political rant in particular that was so bad, it nearly got her cancelled. But her family’s money was able to hire the best spin team around and get her out of it. However, it was only a matter of time before she pulled another stunt that set the internet ablaze. It was as if she got off on pushing to see just how much she could get away with without burning her whole world to the ground.

If I’d really stopped to think about it, I would have realized I didn’t even like my best friend. In fact, I couldn’t stand her, but that was the thing, I didn’t stop to think. Because in the groups I ran in, liking the people I called friends didn’t matter just as long as I was photographed with them regularly. Jealousy ran rampant through our circle, constant rumors of this person talking behind that person’s back. So-and-so sleeping with what’s-her-name’s boyfriend to get back at her for some petty slight. There was always some sort of drama, and most days it was exhausting. But it was the life I had chosen, and I had been determined to stick it out.

Thus began the long line of shitty choices that kept getting me into all kinds of trouble. And this was where I ended up: behind bars, a slew of paparazzi outside the police station waiting for a chance to snap a photo of me looking like a hot mess, while I waited for my parents to swoop in and save the day.

Chapter Two

Rae

Shame coated my throat like thick, rancid syrup, leaving an awful taste behind and threatening to choke me. The silence that had enveloped the room pressed down on my shoulders so hard I felt as if it might flatten me right into the plush, four thousand dollar area rug beneath my feet.

My parents had lapsed into silence more than five minutes ago, after I’d finished explaining, in great detail, the events that had taken place the night before, and honestly, I would have preferred they yell. It would have been so much better if they’d screamed and cursed and raged at my stupidity. Anything other than their silent disappointment that was slowly suffocating me.

I could see the exhaustion on their faces, the jetlag hunching their tired frames from the hours they’d spent awake. All because of me. My father had been on the European leg of his tour, performing in sold-out stadiums for eager fans who were dying to see him live for the first time in fifteen years. I’d been eight when he made the decision to stop touring. He hadn’t wanted to disrupt my life more than necessary by dragging me along for months at a time, and he couldn’t stand being away from my mom and me for more than a day or two at a time. When he announced earlier that year that he’d be hitting the road again to promote his latest album, they couldn’t put the tickets up fast enough. Shows across the globe sold out in record time.

With me being grown and out on my own, my mother decided it was the perfect time to go with him, working her schedule out so that they could use the trip as a second honeymoon of sorts. She had retired from performing a while back, claiming no one wanted to see a middle-aged burlesque dancer. However instead of taking it easy, she started choreographing for hit Broadway musicals and other productions that took her all over. The good thing was she could make her own schedule, accept whatever jobs she wanted and pass on others.

At that very moment, my father was to be enjoying the one night he had off before having to hit the stage in Liverpool and performing for a crowd of thousands of excited fans, not here with me, having used what little free time he and my mother had to contact his lawyer to get his only daughter out of lockup and clean up the mess I’d created.

Never in my entire life had either of them told me I let them down, but I knew I’d disappointed them more times than I could keep count. Especially in the past four years since I’d decided to pack up and move to L.A., insisting I was ready to make it on my own. When it turned out that being a grownup entailed a hell of a lot more than I had been prepared to handle, they hadn’t blinked at helping me out.

Not once did they throw in my face that they were still taking care of me, even from an opposite coast. From my luxury condo, to the cherry red Beamer down in the parking garage, to my utilities and groceries. They basically covered the cost of everything I needed in order to survive. I may have moved out, but I wasn’t doing a damn thing on my own. That was for sure. They bankrolled my entire life, all while hoping I’d eventually get my shit together. But I had a feeling all of that was about to change.

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