"So this is what it looks like from your side?"
I hum, my fingers basically cramping from the aggressive typing for the last ten minutes. "This is what it looks like on the other side. This is where I create my masterful sentences that make you more famous and me a little bit richer." I flash him a phony smile and he rolls his eyes.
"Hey," I glance back at him, his eyes now shut as he lies on his back "tell me why you need me again?"
"What do you mean?"
"Why do you need my nude photography to give you more attention? Do you not have any other scandals?"
He lightly chuckles, his fingertips prancing across my lower back. "I don't have any scandals. This would be my second."
My eyebrow raises as my fingers pause. "Second?"
He sighs and I feel the bed shift as he rolls over, the light tapping of his finger tips disappears from my senses. "Are you going to tell me what the first was?"
I shut my laptop and toss it gently to the end of the bed, my body rolling on top of his as I smile up at him. "Don't be shy now, Julian. What was your first scandal?"
I know that it was rumored to be about him and Lola, but there was nothing that came of that. I guess now I can find out if there should've been something from that.
His arm fell from his eyes as he adjusted his head down slightly to look at me lying on his chest, my fingers clasped together underneath my chin. "It was a rumor about Lola and I hooking up. That's all."
"That's all? Was it true?"
"You're nosy."
"We know, that's why we are here in the first place. Tell me."
He chuckles and turns his head to avoid my curious stare. "No, it wasn't true. Lola replaced one of my original backup dancers when she suddenly got pregnant and wanted to focus on that. I knew Lola in high school and we just happened to reconnect at a time when I needed her. I was still kind of fresh and it was kind of stressing me out, she offered to help and that's it. She's been one of my best dancers since."
I hum, "so you've never slept together?"
He smiles as he suddenly flips over top of me, his hand holding my thigh up against his hip. "You ask a lot of questions. Maybe you're not tired enough."
And like that, I'm distracted. How could I not be?
...
I watch through my camera lens as Julian, Harvey, and Lola change some of the steps before the rest of the dancers get here. They've been mostly silent. Harvey has probably tried to start a conversation at least four times in the past third minutes and he's gotten nothing but short responses from Lola and nothing but directions from Julian. Harvey has obviously given up and is just waiting for the tension to hopefully be broken by the arrival of the other dancers.
My job right now is to take 'behind the scenes photos' for Julian's tour album. Anderson and some of the others thought it was a good idea for Julian to create a photo album of different parts of the tour to help with promo.
I think it's a good idea, but it's kind of unnecessary when he has highly speculated half-nude pictures circulating the internet. His face still hasn't been in any of the pictures but his tattoos are too unique for them to not know it's him.
I made the post late and that somehow amassed even more views. I think I made 1k in clicks and adverts combined just in the last 10 hours.
"They should be here soon right? What time is it?"
I glance up at the group, Harvey impatiently checking his watch for Julian but hoping the time is up.
I scroll through my pictures and try to predict which ones will be the best to begin a draft with, but I don't think I'm very good at it because I almost always end up using the trash files.
"Luna."
My head tilts up, my eyes wide at the sudden calling of my name and the tall man standing over me. "Did you get any good pictures?"
"No. I've been sitting over here for an hour and got nothing." My tone is purposefully dry, I'm hoping he's irritated enough to not understand my 'sarcasm' which isn't really sarcasm because I very well could have been sitting over here for even three hours and got nothing.
"I love that you think you're funny, but if you couldn't tell, nobody laughed."
"I'm always laughing and I never said that's what the goal was? What if—"
I'm cut off by the heavy screeching of the metal door opening in the back and the laughter that follows along with the footsteps of the dancers.
"Hey guys!" I smile at Harvey's excitement as I collect my stuff in my bag and get up to make my exit.
The music begins to play louder and fill up the entire space, signaling that Julian should probably go do his job, but no, he stays in front of me.
"It's like you're getting paid to stand here." I glance up at him as I pull my star over my head and onto my shoulder. "Is there something else you wanted to ask me-"
He pulls an iphone box out of his pocket and hands it to me. "Is this an early birthday gift? I would like to say thank you but—"
"No. It's your work phone."
My eyes level shut, "I think that the discreet nature of this exchange is very different from how other people usually revive a 'work phone'."
He chuckles and unzips my bag before stuffing it inside and underneath my hoodie. "Julian what is it for?"
"It's for us. Your work is an overpaid prostitu-"
"Watch it.. I'm not that low yet."
His lips play on a smile that he tries to hide. "Yea, whatever. You are an overpaid photographer who just happens to fuck like she was trained by Aphrodite herself." The last part was whispered in my ear, so closely I could hear every syllable without a doubt.
He leans away from me, his brown eyes no longer filled with sleep or indifference. He was looking at me like we just finished playing a game and he couldn't wait for the next round.
"Julian! You're the one who has a show in ten hours! Come on!"
He turns back to me, the look gone but not fully faded. A glimpse still remaining as his eyes met mine once more. "That's my cue. Just look out for my texts and try not to make it obvious that you have two phones."
I nod as he jogs off into position in front of the rest and as if he wasn't just entirely unfocused, he snapped back into the music. I stand and watch for a few seconds, his voice blaring across the entire studio as he moves in sync with his own chords.
The entire studio was filled with dancers who are obviously very good at what they do. Each one of them moving like this is a sixth sense. Even despite every one of them being obviously talented enough for a regular person to not notice if they missed a step or if they are completely off beat, the three at the front completely captivate the room.
And if this isn't a perfect shot, I don't know what is.
...
"Julian is on the cover of every magazine...I wonder if that has any correlation with how ever.single.one of his shows is sold out."
Cheers erupt across the stage.
"We haven't been one hundred percent sold out in two years!"
I smile as I continue to tie my shoe and the dancers discuss amongst themselves about how big the crowds are gonna be even in the smaller locations and wonder if they would be noticed at any bars along the way.
"You did a good job."
I glance up at Anderson, his signature stoic expression brushed on his prettt face like a painting.
I stand up in front of him, my elbows faced outward as my hands rest on my hips. "At what? Fucking your brother?"
He scoffs and rolls his eyes and I take a deep breath, "oh! You meant at taking pictures. My bad. You know I just have so many responsibilities, it's hard to remember which ones you're referring to."
"That's enough conversation for today, Miss. Marlow. I hope you're ready for the real thing. Try not to get caught in a stampede." He smugly smirks over his shoulder as he walks off backstage.
I glance at Julian as he talks to the sound directors then over at the lighting people as they coordinate with Harvey.
This whole thing seems a lot calmer than I thought, but maybe that's because everybody knows what they're doing and my job is almost completely separate from theirs. I wonder if Julian is ever stressed about any of it.
I guess it's similar to when I'm shooting.
Like that one time I had an amateur model shoot when I was first starting and it was fifteen girls all of different shades. A lot of lighting difficulties and finding makeup artists who weren't going to try to fix that by brightening the deeper skin tones.
It was stressful then because it was my first big shoot but now, I know it wouldn't be that chaotic.
"Luna."
I hum, my thoughts drifting out of my one ear to make space for whatever Lola had to say.
"What's up?" I get to my feet and dust my butt off.
"Can you tell me something? Honestly."
My head tilts almost automatically, my body as confused as my mind. What kind of question would I have to answer 'honestly' right now?
Her voice lowers as soon as the first letter comes out and now I can see her pretty, tired eyes become more serious and dark. "Are you and Julian sleeping together?"
My heart skips a beat but I don't let it show—hopefully.
Now, here's a dilemma. Lie and possibly get caught in that lie later. Or I can tell the truth and tell something Julian obviously doesn't want certain people to know or he would've said something.
What to do...