Soundtrack: Slowdive - Sleep
Dedication: sarah with an h (@lousmiles) hiiii i was gonna say that i feel like you've been around forever, then you commented saying you were reading tangerine on ao3, long before it was even on wattpad ha! i'm sososo glad that you like my writing, you're too kind — i spend extra time and work twice as hard on these chapters (and the full circle of the story overall) just for people like you :)
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I sit in the chair next to my manager, craning my neck to look up at him slowly.
He looms over me, not saying anything just yet. His stiff presence makes me want to crawl into myself and disappear just a little bit so he can glare right through me, rather than directly into me.
Mitch remains leaning against his desk, fixing the expensive watch around his wrist, until he speaks.
"Three things," he says. "We're going to go through all of them, you're going to try not to cut in as much as you love to, and everything should go rather smoothly. Okay?"
A tangle of guilt forms in my stomach. We haven't even begun and the man is already looking at me like I've been blathering on for ages. I nod my head, not wanting to say a single thing, for discomfort that a simple "fine" from me might be taken sarcastically on his end.
"Great. First, we need to talk about the Malik family party in Toronto," he says, all too calmly to be normal. "What were your instructions?"
"Instructions?" I frown, suddenly put on the spot. "I, uh... Take selfies with Harry? Wasn't that it?"
"Yes," the man purses his lips curtly, "and...?"
I draw my hands in by my sides, contemplating how I'm going to say what I'm going to say before I say it.
"Mitch. Please-" I swallow in inferiority. "I'm sorry- I know you want me to think about it, but please, can you... spare me? Just tell me what I've done, instead of having me guess all day long?"
Mitch visibly drags his tongue along his teeth, roughly pulling out a separate wooden chair for himself and turning it backwards. He sits heavily on the seat with his hands clasped together over its backrest, waiting directly in front of me.
He looks as if he's expecting me to say something further. I don't say a thing just to prove him wrong. If he's going to refuse to communicate with me, I'm going to refuse it right back to him.
"Do you think you can do anything you please?" Mitch finally speaks up after a long, irritating silence. "Is everything you do meant for your own benefit and no one else? Have you forgotten that you're working for an entire team of people, and not just for yourself?"
The man's tone of voice is so unpleasant, it nearly brings a cringe upon my face, although I could never show it.
"What are you talking about?" I question dubiously.
Mitch looks at me as if I should know what he's trying to get out of me, although I haven't a clue, "A number of sources informed the Twittersphere about your activities with Harry that evening. They said you were snogging all night long."
"Oh my god, that's it?" I sigh, feeling like a balloon just deflated in my chest. "Okay?"
"That's it?" Mitch repeats critically. "Scarlet, I specifically instructed you not to display any kissing with Harry that night."
"You-" my breath hitches and the pulse in my chest quickens. "I thought that was just for the selfies."
"You thought wrong."
At this point, a part of me wishes there was a member of security in the room, just so Mitch's remarks would be slightly more filtered. I don't like when he talks to me like this. I can't stand feeling like so much less than I could possibly be.
"Next time I send you something, you need to read it with extra care," Mitch enunciates, his eyes never straying from mine. "Read it twice, if you have to, because you can't keep screwing up like this."
"Screwing up?! Come on, I'm sorry! I didn't know! From the way it was worded, I thought we were just texting about the pictures the entire time!"
"Maybe you need to do a little less thinking and a little more doing," Mitch raises his eyebrows at me and I know I can't respond to that. "You're just lucky there weren't any pictures... but that brings us to our next point."
"Mhmm," I hum with my hand to my temple. Anything else I want to say will ultimately be proved wrong, so I might as well keep my mouth shut for my own sanity.
"The second thing," Mitch eyes me in my reserved position, "has to do with your two favourite people in the world."
"Jimi Hendrix and John Lennon?" even I can't help but smirk at that one.
"Yes, Scarlet," Mitch drawls, "I called you up here to talk about two dead stoners. Are you having a laugh?"
"Oh, come on, if I can't have a laugh, what's anything worth?" my expression softens, but only slightly.
And is that-? It is.
Mitch is actually smiling for the first time I've noticed all day. It's not excessive, but it's visibly there. It makes me satisfied to know that I can still spark that in the man, especially at a time like this.
It seems like the closer I'm becoming with Harry and the boys, the further I'm fading from my relationship with Mitch. We used to be on the same wavelength, always laughing at each other's jokes and making light of even the darkest of situations. Now, it seems like that has all disappeared.
It's rare that I do see my manager smile, unless he's having an occasional good day. His eyes have dulled and his wrinkles have darkened, two years worth in just under nine months. I used to think it was just stress, now I don't know what to think.
"If it sounds like I'm being a little harsh, that's because I am," Mitch explains, expression remaining somewhat mild, despite our heavy subject matter. "The second thing we're here to discuss has to do with certain pictures that were taken of you and more than one lad."
My face blanches, my eyes suddenly searching the room for any memory of being out in the public eye with Louis and Harry. Of course, it's Louis and Harry; which two other lads would it be? To my misfortune, I can't recall a single thing.
"What pictures?" I question.
Mitch watches me intently, "Do you recall a party, not so long ago, where you were carried on the back of Harry Styles?"
I bite my lip, "You're gonna have to be more specific."
There is a flicker in Mitch's eyes, but I can't quite tell what it is. Annoyance, maybe. Displeasure.
Yet, that's not it at all.
"I don't want to make this long, Scarlet," the man persists.
"Okay," I shrug simply. "Don't."
My manager lets out a slow, deep sigh, massaging two fingers into the crease down the centre of his forehead, "There was a party. All of us were there. Harry was carrying you. And somehow ‒ it's beyond me ‒ you both ended up on the ground with Louis Tomlinson."
Oh.
"Yeah, I- I do remember that."
We were all so drunk and high and Louis tripped Harry and me to the ground mid-piggyback, so naturally, I had to pull him down with us. We were all wrestling ‒ if you could call drunkenly climbing over each other wrestling ‒ and while the three of us were a stranded mess of bodies over bodies, Harry somehow managed to grab onto Louis' shin. We were literally stuck, we were laughing so hard. Louis was exaggeratingly pointing at Harry's hand around his own shin, and when the lad finally did manage to speak, all he could squeak out was, "Shin-dler's list!"
I almost want to burst out laughing at the memory, but this is definitely not the time, nor place.
So many people were watching us and Harry and Louis probably did piss their pants then, like everyone had been predicting all night. Though, regardless of how many bodies were at that beach house in Miami that night, it was strictly a crew party.
Everyone who works with us has a proper idea of what can and cannot be photographed at these kind of events ‒ and, well, ever, really ‒ so from what I can gather, there is no way anyone would have taken any photographs of us that night; suspicious positions or not.
I inform Mitch with just as much, but he still holds tight to his story with a shake of his head.
"Whatever you think, Scarlet, someone did take pictures of you three. They don't look good. They're rather risqué shots, if you get what I'm saying, and what's going to happen if those pictures get leaked?"
"They're not leaked?" I frown.
"Not yet," he concedes, "not yet, but if they do, you're in for a hell-storm, my dear. Keep in mind that these images aren't just of you and Harry, but of Louis, too. How is the world going to react if they find out that you're fooling around with two members of the same band? Best friends, no less. You don't want your fans to think you're a slut, now, do you?"
All of a sudden, my heart hits the floor.
"Whoa, excuse me?!" so many thoughts are exploding in my head at once, all I can do is scoff and blink. "Why would you say that?"
The man curls the corners of his mouth down, but only for a brief moment, "I'm not going to censor, for you, what other people might think."
"Wow. Hold on," I shake my head, bewildered in pure disbelief. "That is a disgusting word. You know I can't stand that word."
"Okay, I'm sorry," he reasons. I'm not sure if he is apologising because he actually takes what he said back, or simply because he wasn't expecting to get caught. "You don't want your fans to think you're seeing anyone except Harry. Is that any better?"
"I'm gonna send you some articles but like-" I lean back in my chair, overcome and overwhelmed, "wow."
People misuse the term slut so freely these days. It's like if someone enjoys having sex and isn't ashamed to admit that they've slept with more than a couple of people, they're degraded and automatically put down as a slut. The word is horribly misused, mainly because most people don't have a clue as to what it actually means, if there really is one true definition at all. It's getting better, but the wave of ignorance that still exists among today's youth and even adults, for that matter, is massively stunting the whole 60's free love movement that I've always personally admired.
I've been called a slut before. I'm probably being called a slut right now, at this very moment, considering I'm supposedly dating one of the most famous people in the world. I just feel so bloody degraded. It's different, hearing that sickening word come from my own manager, rather than from someone behind a screen who doesn't know a thing about me.
"All I want you to understand," Mitch continues, "is that there are pictures out there that could seriously put a dent in your career. Sure, they would give you a momentary rise, but it would be hard to recover from and even more difficult to prove yourself to the world after they see you like that."
I sigh, gathering my thoughts in deep understanding, "Okay, but the photos were from ages ago."
"That doesn't matter, Scarlet," Mitch sustains. "It would be brand new information to the world, if it were to get out. Even if it was from two years ago, it would be just as valuable."
"Valuable," I roll the word around in my mouth. "Well, the pictures aren't leaked, right? And I'm pretty sure the world is perfectly preoccupied with Harry and I kissing, at the moment."
"Maybe you weren't supposed to have mouth sex with Harry in front of everyone."
"Holy shit, it's not like it was Louis and I that were snogging," I snap, immediately cringing at myself because I know I'm just setting myself up for disaster. "It's not like I'm sneaking around or cheating on anyone. Harry and I haven't even hooked up like that, if you care to know. I don't understand why you're so concerned with what I'm doing on my own time. That's weird, Mitch."
A fiery dullness swells in my manager's pupils, "I don't know if you've forgotten, but it's my job to be concerned with your personal business."
"Okay, but not my body," I swallow down a whimper.
"Fitness-wise? Yes, it is," he goes on. "Deciding what the public eye sees and doesn't see about you? That, too."
"You know what I mean."
Mitch clears his throat. Without a word, he stares sternly at me, blinking deliberately. The way he is doing so, makes me twist from the inside and rethink everything I've just said.
"Are you going to keep telling me what my job is?" the man asks in a slow, temperate voice, as smooth as stolen velvet. "Or can we talk about the last thing now?"
My hands ball into fists, but I quickly hide them. I almost want to scream, I'm so frustrated. I'm trying not to interrupt my manager, I really am, but the way he keeps slipping in things that I just have to correct is nearly putting me over the edge.
"Well?" he voices through my forced silence.
I nod, swallowing thickly, "Yes. Go on."
"Good. Here's the plan: you and Harry are a big topic of discussion right now, and we want to make the most of it while it's happening," he purses his lips, letting out a huff as he looks over his papers. "You're to fly to LA tomorrow and spend the night with Harry in a private club downtown. You don't have to stay the entire night, but Harry does. We've already booked your hotel. You'll be staying in separate rooms, but you'll be on the same floor for the night, as will your assistants, so you don't have to worry."
I want to say, "It's fine, I've slept with Harry before," but I know that would just cause a whole new round of hypercriticism, so I remain reserved.
Mitch looks up at me from the papers in his lap, "Sound good?"
"Yes... but I'm not double-booked, am I?" I voice, just to make sure. "Like, I know we have three days off, but I thought I had rehearsals on the seventeenth?"
"You do," he responds. "You'll only be in LA for two days."
I nod, accepting my instructions. I never seem to realise how busy I am until Mitch lays it all out like this. Then, when he does, I have an internal anxiety attack.
Our discussion is summed up in mere minutes. Mitch restates everything we've talked about, just to make sure I've gotten the gist of things. Then I stand up, ready to leave.
"Remember, play it up for the cameras, so it gets people talking," Mitch emphasises as he shows me towards his suite door. "Otherwise, those pictures might have to be leaked, after all."
I put on an approving face, but I know what he's implying. Because of one drunken mistake, I forever owe Mitch. Everything is blackmail now.
I wish it wasn't like this, but I can't do much. Mitch has so much power over me, and what I do, and how I live my life. I never expected him, of all people, to crack down and use his authority for any reason aside from the wellbeing of others, but honestly, I should have seen it coming.
No one is ever as good as you think they are.
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I've been thinking a lot about what Mitch said, but not in the ways he might expect me to.
From everything we talked about in our meeting earlier today and all of the memories that have flooded back to me since, I've come to realise that Louis probably never loved me like I thought he did. At least, not around the time of the crew party in Miami, or else he wouldn't have behaved so carelessly.
At the time, it was a laugh; Louis tripping Harry while I was on the boy's back, causing us both to fall to the ground. Spiritedly pulling Louis down with Harry and myself so unexpectedly. The three of us wrestling until we couldn't breathe from laughter. Now, I'm slowly realising that Louis wasn't bothered if he second-handedly hurt me, so long as he had a way to one-up his best friend.
It's not just that.
When I first suggested that we try and be friends a month ago, Louis told me that he couldn't live without sex. Which is understandable, because really, neither can I. Although, if Louis genuinely cared for me, a short break in our sex life wouldn't have been the huge, life-changing issue he made it out to be.
It's things like these that make me question his supposed affection towards me. Louis is a very protective and jealous person by nature, of course, but like Naomi taught me, over-protectiveness and jealousy don't account for real love.
Obviously, I can get unreasonably jealous, myself, sometimes ‒ believe me ‒ but in Louis' case, it's so much more than that.
When Louis gets jealous, he makes it abundantly known how he's feeling, to the point where he can often come off as a little rude. I understand that it's his personality and he does have that witty, snappy sense of humour, but it's just something that has been biting at me lately, especially after my meeting today.
Fuck.
It's not like Louis and I have never been close. I really believed that I was in love with him, back when we were exploring Europe and I was new to the public scene. He helped me more than he even knows, even to this day, with all of the rumours I was experiencing at the time, and he allowed me to experience life in a world far away from our own, if only momentarily. The lad wore my socks, for Christ's sake, if that doesn't mean something.
But those are just memories now.
His love was ripped away before I got a chance to feel it.
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Sometime during the middle of the day, I took a turn for the maudlin.
I haven't left my hotel room since I returned from Mitch's. I haven't been checking my mobile since I turned it off. I didn't even bother to open the curtains that cover my heavily dimmed window. I'm still working on this bottle of white wine I ordered from room service twenty minutes ago, but even that's nearly done.
I can't stop sniffling.
There are countless thoughts swirling through my brain, giving me this pounding headache, and they all result in Louis. To believe that I was so quick to have genuine feelings for the lad, even after our second time partying. I've always had feelings for him, I'm not gonna bluff, but right now, I don't know exactly where they lie.
They say that the power in a relationship lies with whoever cares less. Granted, Louis and I never had a real relationship, but there was definitely a whole lot of feelings spread around between the two of us. Lately, however, it seems like Louis isn't really concerned with having as much of that power anymore and I'm left feeling empty.
But is empty that bad if what I'm really feeling is worse?
I finally manage to drag myself over to the desk in the single room, hugging myself as I wrap my cardigan around my torso. I sit on the chair and lower my head to my arms, fiddling with the knobs on the drawer in front of me, sliding it open and closed until my tipsy fingers send it nearly rocketing into my lap.
Aside from a bible that falls to the floor, I'm mesmerised by a number of tiny carvings etched into the grainy wood, decorating the inside of the empty drawer before my eyes.
Bailey Loves Jessica, is dug deeply into the top right side of the drawer.
12/12/84, proudly by the bottom.
A lonely, I AM GAY, etched lightly along the left side.
The faded edges of the letters and numbers in the drawer suggest that the carvings are years, some even decades old.
I lower my hand to the wood, running my fingers over the indents in the grain. Another wave of emotion hits me like a windstorm. I'm way too overly-sentimental to even be around myself right now.
Why does today have to suck so fucking much?
I spend another extended moment, simply looking over the small drawings, before spontaneously grabbing a pair of travel scissors from my makeup kit, all-too prepared to create a new decoration of my own.
I take my time etching my heart into the thick bottom of the drawer. I finally begin to feel my drunken mind slowing to focus on one thing, and it's this. No rumours, no manager, just scratching into wood using a pair of scissors that I will probably have to replace once I'm done.
Seconds turn into minutes and I'm the most patient I've been all day. I don't feel like ranting, I don't feel like writing a song, all I feel like doing is this. And I'm satisfied.
Turning my scissors in my hand as I cross my final letter, I desolately lean back to observe my work:
Dear Louis,
You make me happy.
You make me twice as sad.
- Scarlet
I'm pouting and I'm heaving but my tears dried up half an hour ago. Now I'm just an ungroomed lump of self-pity. I don't know how things are supposed to be, but I do know they aren't nearly supposed to be like this.
Suddenly, there is a knock on my hotel room door. My head shoots up towards the sound. I'm completely drawn away from my desk as I get up, leaving the nostalgic drawer resting on the chair behind me.
Ignoring an accidental trip over my toes, I reach the door.
I'm almost ready to grab the handle and unbolt the lock, until one glance through the peep hole sends me stumbling backwards with my breath caught high in my throat.
It's Louis.
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thank you so much for reading, voting and all of your lovely comments :)
yes, mitch is hugh grant x
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