Page 1 of Oops Baby for the Rockstar
One
Tamsin
Three months ago
I’ve always had a reckless streak. Growing up the way I did, squeezed into a sagging trailer with my mom and her guy of the week, praying for space and a chance to breathe—it messes with your head. Leaves a mark.
People go one of two ways after a childhood like that, one filled with empty beer bottles and pounding music. Either you curl in on yourself, talk in whispers, try to take up even less space in the hope that no trouble comes your way… or you get mad. Get reckless. You start to wonder, what’s the worst that could happen? What could be worse thanthis?
It’s thinking like that which got my ass on an overnight bus out of state. Leaving that awful trailer behind me forever.
It’s thinking like that which got me working twelve, fourteen, sometimes sixteen hour shifts on the Wishbone cross country tour, slicking up my skin with sweat and grime as I helped unload and repack trucks of sound equipment all night and intothe next morning. Dog tired and barely scraping by, but happy for the first time in my life. Free.
And it’s thinking like that which gets me in the biggest trouble of all, when a dropped VIP pass to meet the band backstage blows against my boot in a venue parking lot one night. The crowds are already packed inside, screaming at the tops of their lungs, the music throbbing through the concrete beneath my feet. I look down, squint at the pass, try to kick it off for a second… then stop, reckless thoughts suddenly simmering away in my head.
Spots of rain mist my cheeks as I stand there. Not enough to wash away the grime, but enough to wake me up. To make me feel all jittery with excess energy.
Why not?I think.What’s the worst thing that could happen?
Right there in that parking lot, I think about the night off ahead of me, and the fanciest pieces of second hand clothing in my bag on the crew bus, and the fact that I’ve never once even met the band I’ve been working for over the past few months.
I think about all the women in the crowd screaming themselves hoarse for the band, desperate for just a glance in their direction. I think about the tour posters, and the way my heart stutters each time I glimpse one, with the lead singer’s dark eyes staring clean into my soul.
And I think about the fact that tonight, if someone hadn’t dropped this VIP pass, that lead singer, Jett Santana, would be meeting someone else backstage after the show. Someone with cash to burn on meeting Wishbone. Someone careless enough about that opportunity that their pass is now rain-sprinkled and flattened against my boot.
“Huh,” I say, back aching from the day’s shift as I bend down to snag the pass. It peels away from my boot easily, flapping in the breeze.
Cheeks warm, I glance around the parking lot, but there’s no one watching me. No one to catch me in the act. No one except the big band poster on the side of one of the trucks, with Jett Santana’s broody gaze following my every move. Making me all flustered, even though I’ve never met the man.
…Yet.
I haven’t met himyet.
But it would be too bad to let a VIP pass go to waste. I mean, it’s not likeI’llever have that kind of money kicking around, right? This is my chance.
Turning on my heel, I salute the giant Wishbone poster before marching toward the crew bus with its cubby beds and tiny, lukewarm shower. Time to scrub myself clean, and dress myself in something other than a baggy tour t-shirt and holey jeans.
I’m about to meet Wishbone.
My heart beats faster, and I grin up at the cloudy night sky before stepping onto the bus.
* * *
Two hours later, my dark hair is washed, combed and mostly dried, my skin smells like soap, and I’ve sweet-talked my way into borrowing some makeup. Patty, one of the tour photographers, was lazing on her tiny bed when I got out of the bus shower, flipping through an ancient Us Weekly, and she was all too happy for a project to fill her empty night.
“You’re not taking photos tonight?” I murmur, trying not to move my face too much. Patty purses her lips and shakes her head, the eyeliner pencil steady in her hand.
“Night off.” She doesn’t sound pleased. Guess the crew bus is pretty boring if you’re not used to small, cluttered spaces. Forme, it’s like home all over again—but with a better kitchenette and less yelling.
“You could go take photos anyway? Of the band, or like… of anything.”
Patty scoffs and smiles, drawing a careful line of kohl around my other eye. Her own make up is perfect and catlike, even while lounging around the crew bus in her sweats, and her platinum blonde bangs are straighter than a ruler.
“I’m old,” Patty says, even though there’s no way she’s older than, like, thirty. “Old and tired. If they tell me I’ve got a night off, I’m gonna spend that bad boy sprawled on my bed reading trash and eating chocolate.”
“Well, when you put it like that…”
She gives me a chunk of milk chocolate before shooing me off the bus, fully made up with the VIP pass clutched in my hand.
