Caught in the rush
Chapter Eight
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"For the love of Christ, put her on, are you insane!" the station manager of KNX screamed, "if a celebrity wants to go on the air, put her on the air!"
Two minutes later, Penny was on the air.
"I want to extend a personal hello to everyone that is trapped in this pileup with me. I am sorry to interrupt your news cast, but I have a couple of things to say. First and foremost, I know a lot of you out there are miserable, hungry, thirsty or tired. I am trying to get some food and water out here to you guys. I know that I am not responsible for this, and I'm not doing this for publicity, I just feel bad that so many of you out there are without. Anyone with a cell phone, I beg you to let anyone who needs to, use it to let their loved ones know where they are, and to call for assistance if they need it, which brings me to the next thing I want to say. Any of you out there, the elderly or anyone with any medical problems, if you need any help, please either call here to KNX, the newscaster will give you the number after I finish, or call 911. Help will get to you as soon as possible. Anyone out there with small children who are out of diapers and/or formula, call the station, give them your name and which car you are driving. When the snacks are sent out, the volunteer workers will try their best to bring you want you need. Don't worry about anything, I've got it covered. I only wish that I could clear this up so you can go home, or wherever it is you're going. Now, I have a special message to one commuter in particular.
Dirk, I'm sorry all this happened. I hoped that you would have known by now that I never mean anything I say when I'm angry. You should know damn well that you would have made it with or without me. You and the rest of the band made it together, you'd be nothing without them, and they'd be nothing without you. You can't walk out on them when they need you. They are not the ones that hurt you, I am.
As for me, my career may be able to go on without you, but as a human being, I can't, I would be completely lost. If you had listened to everything I said, you wouldn't be so upset and hurt, but you won't let me reach you so I can explain. I want to fix this, but I don't know how now. I love you so much, but I can't force you to be with me anymore if that's not what you want. If you don't want to listen to me, I can't do anything about that. But please, don't abandon your friends and the concert. Don't risk your career on me. I'm sorry about everything, please don't leave. Tell me what to do.
I thank you all for your time. Sorry again for interrupting your news."
Dirk, who was slightly more intoxicated by this time, had taken to trying to bury his head in the seat, to avoid listening to the broadcast, but to no avail. He sat back up and stared, more than slightly annoyed, at Bjornar. "I just know this was your doing," he snarled, lighting a cigarette, "give me one good reason why I shouldn't fire you."
"I can give you several, actually," Bjornar smiled, "first off, you don't have an American drivers license. Secondly, you're piss drunk. All of which adds up to you having to keep sitting here, by yourself on the freeway, once this tanker is out of our way."
"So man, you can't deny her now," Shawn stated, as Dirk flashed Bjornar one last dirty look, "not after that."
"Hide and watch mate," Dirk mumbled, "during her whole, Little Miss Nice speech, did you hear her once apologize?"
"Actually…" Bjornar started to reply, but Dirk interrupted him.
"Did you hear her apologize for saying I was no better than her dad?"
"Well, isn't her saying, "I'm sorry for everything" kinda cover that?"
"No. It's a half-assed apology. She thinks I'm mad about her saying I'm nothing without her, and I'm not. She didn't even address the fact that she insulted me beyond repair."
"Point taken, but I don't think she knows what's pissing you off…"
"Did you also hear her apologize for accusing me of cheating on her?"
"No, actually I didn't"
"Did you hear her once say "I know you really didn't cheat on me with your back up singer, I should have known better than to not trust you". Did you?"
"No."
"Then what?"
"You should tell her, she seems pretty desperate to try and get to you, if she's willing for the entire country to know her personal life. I mean, she's stuck in this shit with you," Shawn interrupted, "she chased after you. She risked her career to try and stop you from risking yours, if she cared more about her career, she would have just let you leave and did the whole concert herself. That's gotta mean something to you."
"Maybe," Dirk sighed, leaning back, "but how can I look her in the eyes ever again, if she's going to actually believe I could do something so horrible as to cheat on her? She actually believes that, and that's going to hang over my head forever. She doesn't trust me, and if she doesn't trust me, how can she really love me? I can't be certain of that anymore. Maybe that's why she didn't want to marry me. You didn't hear her address that either, did you?"
"No," Bjornar replied, quietly, "but she did say to tell her what to do. What do you want her to do?"
"Talk is cheap," Dirk mumbled, "she needs to prove it. And I don't think she can."
"Tell her then man," Shawn yawned, handing him his cell phone, "send her a text message, tell her to prove it. See what happens. If she really loves you, she will."
Penny had taken to sitting on the roof of her limo again, hoping that somehow, Dirk would do the same and try to get to her. As the minutes went by, she started to feel her chest ache. She sat, cross-legged, with her chin resting on her hands, and sighed. Out of nowhere, she saw the brunette with the binoculars from earlier, sitting on the hood of her car, waving at her. "What's up?" she called to her. "You got any cigarettes?" Christine asked, "my friend smoked all mine."
Penny had Kathy hand her a half empty pack of Woodbines that Dirk had left there a few nights earlier, and handed them to Christine, as she hopped off her car and walked over. "The only ones I have are from England," she said, handing the pack to the girl, "you are old enough, right?"
"I'm twenty five," Christine replied, excitedly lighting one, "and cigarettes are cigarettes, thanks a lot."
"Skip it," Penny mumbled, going back to her original sitting position, "where is your friend, by the way?"
"She got tired, she's asleep in the back seat. I heard your announcement on the radio, are you really getting us some stuff to eat?"
"I'm trying. I got hold of the owner of the label I'm with, and he's trying to get some stuff together and have a helicopter drop it off."
"That's cool. Do you think your boyfriend heard?"
"I hope so."
"What do you think he's going to do?"
"I don't know. I keep hoping he'll call me, but he's so stubborn."
"Men. They say we're too emotional, but look at this. All because you wouldn't marry him…"
"Its not that I wouldn't, I just didn't want to do it right now."
"What exactly was your response?"
"I said we can't do that right now, not in the middle of tour."
"See, now that's where you went wrong, that's why he got upset. Instead of saying "No, not now" you should have said, "I want to more than anything, but lets wait until the tour is over, then we can go anywhere you want and get married." You saying no, not now, just made him hear "no". That's why he got hurt, that's why words were said and he got even more hurt."
"You're probably right. Look, if your friend wakes up soon, why don't you guys come over here and hang with my friend and me. Maybe you guys can help me work this out."
"That'll be cool, thanks for the smokes."
As Christine walked off back to her car, Kathy appeared through the sunroof again, handing Penny her cell phone. "Your phone beeped again," she stated, "this time, could you not drop it on my head?"
Penny smiled meekly and took the phone from her. The text message said simply:
"Prove it."
* * *
Penny was getting frustrated.
She wasn't sure exactly what it was she was getting frustrated about. There were so many reasons she had to be angry and frustrated. She was trying to put together some lyrics for her third album, yet so far; she was stuck on one song. Nothing she wrote made any sense.
Penny was trying to write a song for Dirk, as a thank you for what he had written for her so far. He wrote several songs for her, but she hadn't written anything for him yet. So far, all she had for "Angel in my Bed" was "..and there he was…"
There he was what? There he was in all his manly glory? Oh god no, that was too hokey for words. There he was asleep, an angel in my bed? Well, that was good, but now what? Penny was never very good about writing songs, which's why she didn't very often. She was proud of "Too Soon, Too Late" but she hadn't done anything since. She either did covers or had a series of songwriters do her stuff for her. She didn't want to keep doing that. She wanted to write something for Dirk that meant something to him.
Then, there was the other reason she was frustrated. Dirk and the band had been gone for two weeks in New York, doing all the talk shows, and video shows and whatnot, and he was barely back for a week before he was gone again overseas to do every major talk show, concert show and video show for three weeks. He was going to Scotland to do a concert in his hometown of Edinburgh, and she badly wanted to go with him, but she was prevented from doing so because she had to have a meeting with the studio executives, her manager and her publicist, regarding making plans for her upcoming tour. That and she was in the middle of shooting her new video. She barely slept; she was sexually and creatively frustrated.
She stared at the words she wrote on paper and frowned. As great as her fans thought she was, she felt like she couldn't do anything right. She can't even write a song for the love of her life that makes sense. Just a sentence. She couldn't be with him. And even though she believed what he had said about that Leslie girl, that phone call still lingered in her mind. She threw her pen across the room, and jumped on her bed. She felt so inadequate, that she didn't know why Dirk kept dealing with her. She picked up her phone, and trying to keep the tears from coming, called her cousin Melanie.
"You never call me at decent hours anymore," Melanie yawned, "what are you stuck on this time?"
"My whole life."
"You always say that Pen. You're rich, you're famous, and you get to sleep with a very good-looking man, a Scottish man at that. What is it about Scottish men anyway?"
"Their accents, probably."
"Nah, the English have accents, but they hardly inspire a strong sexual feeling in me."
"They do have a brutish reputation, maybe that's it. You were always attracted to the roughneck types."
"It's possible. What attracted you to Dirk?"
"Do we have to talk about Dirk?"
"You mad at him?"
"No, I just really miss him right now, and I'm not going to see him for another couple of weeks."
"What attracted you to him?"
"His eyes. His thin lips, the shape of his nose. The minute he walked by me when I was on Top of the Pops, I just noticed everything about a man that I never noticed before. The way he looks when he wears a tight shirt, when its unbuttoned on top and his necklace is resting just against his chest. The hair on his arms, everything about him is in the right proportion to him. He's not hairy, he's just thin enough, and he's built just right. His accent, when he whispers things in my ear.."
"Keep going."
"I can't. I'm starting to miss him worse. I don't know what he sees in me. I don't know what anyone sees in me."
"You're still letting what Valleri said get to you."
"Maybe she was right."
"She's only right if you let her be right. The only reason she said the things about you that she said was because she will never forgive you for achieving that dream you guys had together. So, you're not a great songwriter. So you do a lot of covers, so what, you do them justice. You're not an imitator; you just like to do them right. She's just bitter and spiteful and instead of backing you up, she tried to knock you down. Remember what she said to you when you told her you were getting a record contract?"
"Yeah, she asked me who I slept with."
"She stopped speaking to you after that, didn't she?"
"Yep."
"She's a bitter, frustrated singer who can't be happy where she is. She's a very popular entertainment reporter, yet she can't forgive you for becoming what she wanted. Fuck that bitch. She was obviously never your friend."
"I guess."
"As for Dirk, why would you question what he sees in you?"
"He's so much more talented than I am, he can play an instrument, he writes his own songs.."
"That doesn't mean he shouldn't love you less."
"Would he still love me the same if I was just some waitress in a bowling alley?"
"He didn't become attracted to you based on your occupation. He was attracted to a very pretty lady with a big chest and big eyes and a big heart. The fact that you're in show business is a good thing, because you can understand his responsibilities and his frustrations. And because you were already a recorded singer before he was, you knew what to keep him away from and what to expect."
"He was already big in Europe when I met him."
"I know that, but he wasn't recorded. He had some minor recordings, from what he said, but nothing like this. He's international now."
"I miss him."
"He'll be back."
"I can't keep doing this. The studio wants me to go on tour soon, an international tour. How can I be away from him that long?"
"Penny, you're rich, you have power. You'll find a way, I know you will. I know this can't be easy on either of you."
"You think he misses me?"
"I'm positive."
"I just wish I could write this song for him."
"You'll find the words. Give it time, great love songs aren't written in a day."
"Layla was."
"That's because Clapton is a God. You have a way to go for that yet."
The next morning, Penny was sitting in the conference room at the studio, seated between her manager, a sassy, African American woman named Tay, and her publicist, Wendy, who was considered every rival musicians worst nightmare. Whenever anything happened to boost a rock stars popularity, Wendy would always rush in and create a situation that made Penny more popular. Though Penny was rarely aware of what the blonde-streaked redhead was doing when her back was turned.
Sitting across from them was Derick, the studio's owner, a couple of lawyers and Dericks secretary, Summer. "Now, my dear Penny," Derick started, "your albums are selling great, and the fans are demanding a tour. Not just nationally this time, we've gotten demands from England, Ireland, Scotland and Australia for you to perform. We need to get you out on the road."
"Here is a list of proposed tour locations," Tay announced, standing up and passing out a list to everyone at the table, "I suggest we start booking dates in the states first, starting in California, working our way across the Midwest towards the East Coast. Then, she can come back to California, rest a bit and then go overseas, eventually ending the tour in Canada, before coming home."
"She's not going to have time to rest, she'll just stagnant," Wendy protested, lightly elbowing Penny, "she should go over to England straight from New York. She'll have a couple of days to rest before her first concert there."
"Everyone needs to rest Wendy," Tay snapped, "do you want what happened to Mariah Carey to happen to her?"
"I'm right here," Penny mumbled, sleepily.
"She can pace herself between tour dates. Instead of bombarding her with dates across the U.S., then letting her rest and do non stop dates across Europe, we will have a Mariah Carey on our hands. We should give her a non-stop tour schedule, with days off between dates. She can do one day breaks between concerts," Wendy replied.
"What will Trouble be doing?" Penny asked, as the lawyers started talking amongst themselves.
"After they do their promotions, we're going to have them open for someone, probably Coldplay," Derick replied, "they'll have their own tour to deal with."
Penny pouted.
"Well, it doesn't matter anyway," Tay continued arguing with Wendy, "we still have to negotiate terms with the individual concert halls regarding ticket sales and dates."
"Okay, okay, I was just saying," Wendy sighed, "now, we need a gimmick of some kind though, some special surprise guests that would pack the fans in."
"I miss Dirk," Penny stated, matter-of-a-factly. Derick looked at her.
"I know you do, dear heart, but he has his career and you have yours."
"You want to keep him away from me, don't you?"
"I'm not trying to."
"Hey, I know," Summer piped up excitedly, "maybe we can have Penny's dad appear at a couple of shows?"
The whole room fell silent as Penny's eyes bugged out of her head. "That, my darling girl," Derick hissed, "was the wrong thing to say."
"First you guys talk about me while I'm right here," Penny sniffed, standing up, "then you don't seem to care that I miss Dirk and that I'm going to be away from him long enough for him to find another girlfriend and forget about me, now you suggest my father being a special guest at my shows? For what? Target practice. I'm outta here."
Penny grabbed her purse and stormed out of the meeting in tears. Wendy jumped up to follow her, but Tay grabbed her arm. "Just leave her be for awhile," Tay ordered, "she's overwhelmed and she misses her boyfriend. She'll be okay."
Wendy sat back down and quietly started going over the proposed tour schedule, when a devious smile came across her face. "I got an idea," she smirked, "not only can we keep them together, but we have our gimmick."
The lawyers looked over at Tay as Derick smiled at Wendy, who placed an overseas phone call to Troubles manager.
Two weeks later, Dirk was home. The words "I missed you" were barely out of Penny's mouth, when Dirk got her on the bed and took her. Dirk hungrily kissed her neck as he rocked in and out of her; Penny clutching his back and his hair as he did so. After Penny came the first time, Dirk stopped and kissed her on the mouth. "What's wrong?" she asked, "you're not done already, are you?"
"We should tour together," he whispered in her ear, as he began kissing her neck again, "the studio thinks it would be a great career move. We could be together all the time."
"Okay," Penny moaned, motioning to Dirk with her hips that she needed him to keep going. And he did.