Popstar - Lashton

01 | all publicity is good publicity

"Look at this," his manager, Brian, yelled. Looking sternly at Luke, Luke snorted. He didn't care much but looked anyway.

"Look at this," his manager repeated and found a bunch of gossip magazines and newspapers. "Luke Hemmings attacks a group of paparazzi, expecting a lawsuit," he read up, "Luke Hemmings show's up drunk on the red carpet. You wouldn't guess what Luke Hemmings was up to tonight. Luke Hemmings is cheating?! Luke Hemmings spends 10,000$ in Vegas. These are headlines about you, Luke."

"So?" Luke asked he didn't care much. He didn't care, people could write whatever they wanted to.

"You are ruining your image. You're a clown to the industry. No one takes you seriously, you're just a celebrity who shows up drunk every other day. You're a joke," Brian continued. Luke, however, still didn't care.

"All publicity is good publicity," the blond said, taking a sip of the strawberry daiquiri. The absolute vodka did something for his brain, which Luke thought was better. Brian, on the other side, didn't think so.

"Give me that," Brian said, he was so mad at Luke, that he was in no mood to a drunken Luke. Besides, it wasn't even past twelve in the morning, this was no time to start drinking. The blond tried on keeping his drink, but when Brian had made up his mind, there was no way Luke could irk him to change it. The blue-eyed male should know this, after ten years working with him.

"I'm trying to enjoy my drink," Luke said and tried to sneak a sip of the sweet drink.

"No, you're done," Brian said, and took the drink out of Luke's hand, and poured the drink out the window, but not before spilling some on Luke. To Luke's great aggravation.

"Look you spilt some on my brand-new pants," Luke complained and sent Brian an ugly glare. Brian didn't care, he had more important things at hand. Like Luke ruining his image in the media.

"There is more, Luke. Drunken celebrity insults fans and refuses to greet them. Luke Hemmings denies obvious drug possession. You can read them yourself," Brian said and smacking the magazines to the table in front of Luke. Course Luke didn't care to read them, but he glimpsed at them and caught the words: Madison Beer, throw up and ruined dress.

To be honest, looking at the image it was him wrecking a white dress with one of his previous meals. However, Luke couldn't remember the event or the night. He was shitfaced that night, just like most nights.

"At least I give them something to write about. They should be glad that I make their job easier," Luke said. The blond just gave zero fucks, he didn't care what the media wrote. They could fuck themselves, so could everyone else. Especially Brian.

"You haven't even seen the Internet or the television" with that Brian turned on the TV. On the screen was Luke, probably from last night, judging by the clothes. It was the same clothes he currently was wearing. Luke should've showered before this meeting, but Brian hadn't let him. Literally dragging his ass out of the bed just to start screaming at him, which wasn't good for Luke's hangover.

"You can all just fuck yourself! Just fuck yourselves, why do you keep fucking following me around, fucking stalkers. Is it your fucking job to fucking irritate people? Con-fucking-grats, you fucking succeeded. Why the fuck are you still here? Are you fucking thick, get the fuck out! Fuck you, fuck you too, fuck all of you. Why are you still filming? Fuck this, just fuck." Brian said nothing, but Luke could tell he was far from impressed.

Of course, this was the news and the curse words were beeped out, and after Luke's outburst, a long beep followed, because Luke just kept cursing. Brian switched channels, and the other one showed a woman talking about him.

"Celebrity Luke Hemmings called of the concert in Japan, and when he asked about it he gave this comment," the screen switched to him, talking to a microphone, clearly drunk or high. Probably both.

"You know, I don't care that much," he slurred the sentence a bit. "I find it more important to drink and have a blast than go please my fans, they can fuck themselves. Where can I leave," Luke's attention moved from the camera to his surroundings. "And can someone get me a decent drink, please!"

The screen switched back to the woman, "yes you heard right Luke Hemmings find it more important to drink than to work. Next on-..." Brian switched the television off. Either too horrified or too ashamed, probably both. Luke knew he'd gone too far, but he said nothing.
He should probably get the concert back on his world tour, but he figured Brian would fix it, so he said nothing.

"I don't know where to start," Brian said to Luke, but mostly to himself. He looked so dejected. "First of all, you don't get to decide what concerts to call off, I do. You're going to Japan. Second, you can't keep going like this, Luke. What happened to you? You used to be such a sweet boy, and now you're a drunken alcoholic."

"That sweet boy grew up," Luke retorted. As expected he knew Brian would fix it, the tour was back on his list of tour dates like it never had been gone.

"I've decided that you can't go on like this," Brian said.

"Oh yeah, what are you gonna do?" Luke challenged him. "You can't stop me from drinking."

"Luke, your image is almost ruined, in a year or two you'll be forgotten if you keep going down this road, so we need some good news about you. To even out the bad ones." Brian explained it as it was simple, but it wasn't. As of now, Luke had no good sides with him. Sure, he could sing, but the music he produced now, wasn't even written by himself. The only thing Luke did was crave attention, and when he got it – it was never the way he wanted it.

He couldn't remember last time he smiled, that wasn't for a camera.

"And how do you plan to do that, I don't know if you've noticed but there are not many good news stories you can possibly write about me." Luke knew he was fucked up, but at least he was aware of it.

"We'll arrange a relationship, you take some pictures where you look happy. Because you're the talk of the town, it'll spread like wildfire, and ta-da, you're not the drunken druggie of a singer."

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I'm hype af for this book! And I hope some of y'all are too!