Page 10 of The Duet

“Did you get any celebrity backstage visitors after the show?” Tim asks. “This being LA and all.”

“Not on opening night.” It used to flatter the hell out of us to have some movie star visit us in our dressing room and blow smoke up our asses for a few minutes. There were certainly times when we ended up partying with the odd celeb. But those days are long behind us now.

Jess shows us her phone screen. “According to #TheLadyKingsInHollywood on Insta, there were quite a few celebrities in the audience tonight.”

Daphne grabs Jess’s phone and pores over it. I understand why it’s a big deal for them. When we were in our twenties, we used to be just like The Other Women, although Instagram hadn’t been invented yet.

“What was it like for you tonight?” I try to find Cleo’s eyes, but she’s staring at the wall. I’m beginning to think she’s on something. She wouldn’t be the only one under the influence tonight, and I’d be a major hypocrite to not allow any controlled substances at this party. The Lady Kings were fervent fans of a little pick me up in the late nineties, but that too is long behind us. It does make it easier to see how these cycles always repeat themselves with every new band that takes off, and The Other Women are very much taking off.

Cleo can do whatever she wants, but worry stirs in me. Maybe because I’m old enough to be her mother. Yet The Other Women are far more wholesome than we ever were at their age. They look like they would get much more of a kick out of a well-branded post on social media than they would out of a top-notch line of coke.

Without saying anything, Cleo gets up and exits the room.

“Is she all right?” I ask.

“Oh, yeah,” Jess’s voice sounds normal for the first time tonight. “Don’t mind Cleo. She’s always like that after a gig. It takes her a while to get back to her full self.”

“Okay.” I get that. To put yourself out there like that, to hold the attention of thousands for song after song, can take a lot out of a person. Some feed off it, like I do. I always got way more from any audience than I could ever give. But some performers need to retreat inside themselves before they feel like they’re part of the rest of the world again. Cleo’s a performer as well as a singer in a band, I could easily tell when I sidled up to her for the last chorus of “I Should Have Kissed You” and she played along as though reacting to me on stage was all she’s ever done in her life.

“Lanaaaaaa!” Someone’s shouting from another room. “Lana, where are you?”

My mind still half on Cleo, and how I am the perfect person to give her some tips on how to handle the post-show blues, I get up. “I’d best deal with this. See you later.” Because I can’t help myself, I shoot a quick wink in Jess’s direction, just so she has something to dream of tonight.

Chapter 8

Cleo

I take off my shoes, roll up my jeans, and dangle my feet in Lana’s pool. I need something to snap me out of this funk that has settled over me. I was perfectly fine after we finished our set. We delivered a great show, didn’t disappoint the majority of the audience who were waiting for their long-lost idols The Lady Kings, and maybe even converted some unsuspecting people into new fans. Seeing The Lady Kings perform got me right into the zone again and when it was time for me to go out there with Lana, I was all amped up and more than ready to go.

But while Lana and I were singing, something happened to me. Yes, it was an honor, and it made all my musical dreams come true, but ever since I walked off that stage—since she so abruptly dropped my hand from hers—some kind of sorrow settled inside me, like a vise clamped on my insides, that I can’t seem to shake.

I want to be inside partying with the band. Tim will start busting out some moves soon because he’s always the first. Daphne will soon follow. Jess will nod along to the beat until she can’t stand it anymore, get over herself, and join Tim and Daphne on the makeshift dance floor.

Instead, I lean backward onto my hands and look up at the sky. I think of Lana sitting here alone at night and taking in the same view. Lana. Lana. Lana. She’s all I’ve been able to think of since she looked into my eyes and sang to me—at least it felt like she was singing the words to me—that she should have kissed me. So much so that, earlier, when she joined me and my bandmates in the living room, I had to remove myself from the situation.

It’s like Lana Lynch, up close and personal like that, all of it amplified by the magic of being on stage with her, is too much for me to take, too much for my brain to process. I can only hope I will get over this soon because we have two more months of being on stage together. Is she going to look into my eyes like that every night? Is she going to throw her arm around my shoulders? Is she going to take my hand when we walk off stage, only to drop it as though I’m a mere prop as soon as the audience can no longer see us?

She might as well. This is show business. This is what we do. I know that, but—

“Hey, kid.” Speak of the devil. Why does she keep calling me kid? I’ll be thirty next year. It’s not like I just graduated from high school. “How’s it going?” She crouches next to me. “Just a word of warning, I get a feeling this party’s about to move outside and your peaceful moment by the pool is about to be rudely interrupted.”

“Thanks for the heads-up.”

“Your bandmates told me not to worry about you. That it can take you a while to come down, but you can talk to me, okay? If you want to.” Lana almost loses her balance and she puts a hand on my shoulder to steady herself.

“Thanks.” I glance at her hand resting on my shoulder. Her fingers are holding on tight. “I’m good.” I can’t talk to Lana about what I’m feeling right now. I don’t even know what I’m feeling. Why my post-show high turned into post-show blues. Or maybe I do know. Maybe I do have an inkling of what performing with Lana has done to me. But in that case, it can never be discussed. It can never be said out loud to anyone, because it’s simply too ludicrous.

“Last I saw of Daphne, she was stripping off her clothes.” Lana pushes herself up. She holds out her hand to me. “Come with me.”

I stare at her hand—again. Where does she want me to go with her? I really shouldn’t. But when Lana Lynch asks you to do something, it’s impossible to say no.

I pull my legs from the water and let myself be hoisted up by Lana. I pick up my shoes and, feet dripping wet, follow her.

She guides me behind the pool house to a path leading into a small copse of trees. We walk for another few yards, my bare feet picking up all sorts of debris, until we reach a small clearing with two Adirondack chairs facing the Hollywood Hills.

“Joan’s favorite spot in the whole wide world,” Lana says.

“Wow.” I lean against the railing. “I can see why.” I hear loud splashing sounds coming from behind the pool house. Lana rescued me from what’s probably turning into a wild pool party in the nick of time. “You don’t mind? All these people in your house?”

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