Follow Me Back (complete first draft of the published book)

Chapter 9: Animals

Chapter 9: Animals

August 2013

Eric slouched down in the back seat of the limo and rubbed his bleary eyes. The ride from the poultry farm back to his hotel would take a little over an hour. He should probably use the time to grab some extra shut-eye, but he had a feeling sleep wouldn't come easy. Not after the hellish day he'd had.

It had started off with so much promise this morning. First Maury had granted him that half-hour reprieve from his workout routine. Then he'd been in such a good mood, setting up the fake Twitter account and taking the selfie.

He couldn't remember the last time he'd had so much fun. Right up to the moment he hit the Tweet button. That's where things always seemed to go downhill.

Of course, that picture in the bathroom hadn't been the one that really got him in trouble today. His heart had nearly jumped right out of his chest later this afternoon, when Maury came up from behind and thrust a cellphone image into Eric's face.

"You wanna tell me what the hell this is, kid?"

Eric had been sitting in his make-up chair, running through the lines of the chicken nugget jingle as a team of stylists sculpted his messy hair into some semblance of order. He looked down at the picture Maury displayed on the phone, expecting to see his bathroom mirror from that morning, but his eyes fell on a Hollywood Life blog post instead. He'd forgotten about that one. It was from back in LA, a couple weeks ago. The cameraman must have taken his sweet time selling it to the highest bidder.

"That dickwad was asking for it," Eric muttered, looking away.

"What did he do? Did he get up in your face?"

"No, he didn't get in my face, Maury. He tailed me for three hours straight!"

"And?"

One of the hairdressers put a finger on the edge of Eric's jawline to tilt his head to the side. He swatted her hand away in annoyance. "Whatever. I don't want to talk about it."

"So you had a pap following you? That's it?"

"It was my first day off in a month! It's kinda hard to relax when some asshole has a telephoto lens pointed at your face all day long."

"Eric, you can't go around giving reporters the finger."

"Reporters." Eric snorted.

Maury glared. "You will get a reputation for bad behavior. These guys can destroy a career faster than you can say 'cheese' if you get on their bad side."

Eric's ears perked up. "Do you think it'll cause a backlash?"

Maury gave him a playful cuff on the cheek. "Nah, the publicists are spinning it that you were provoked. But you only get one get-out-of-jail free card before--"

"I was provoked!" Eric interrupted. "That guy was stalking me, Maury!  I can feel it when they're following me. It makes my fucking skin crawl!"

Maury shook his head. "Paps follow celebrities. How exactly does that come as a surprise to you?"

"I'm just sick of it, that's all. I'm not going to play along anymore--"

"No, Eric. You're not. PR's putting you on a leash until this incident blows over."

"What does that mean?"

"It means you spend your downtime in your hotel room with the curtains drawn. No more gallivanting around town. No more unplanned photo ops."

"What? For how long?"