The Fame Game by Conrad Lauren

Author:Conrad, Lauren [Conrad, Lauren]
Language: eng
Format: mobi, azw3, epub
Publisher: Harper Collins, Inc.
Published: 2012-04-03T07:00:00+00:00

Chapter 17

The TV-Ready Next Big Thing

“Can I bring you something to drink while you wait for your friend?” Kate asked the woman in hot-pink yoga pants.

The woman blinked at her, smiling vaguely. She was obviously having a very hard time not looking at the PopTV cameras. No doubt Laurel was annoyed, but Kate thought it was funny: You could order people to pretend the camera crew wasn’t there; you could beg them to “act natural”—but as soon as the camera was rolling they stared into the lens like deer in headlights.

Kate wondered if people were like that everywhere, or if it was a fascination unique to Los Angeles. “Pellegrino?” she suggested helpfully.

The woman thought about this for such a long time that Kate was starting to think she hadn’t heard her. It was ten minutes before the end of her shift, and from the looks of it they were going to be the longest ten minutes of her life.

“Um, what about the lemonade? Is that sugar-free?”

“No, but it’s delicious,” Kate chirped.

The woman threw up her hands. “What the heck! It’s Friday,” she said.

Simone, one of her coworkers, sidled up to Kate as she poured a glass of lemonade. “If lemonade is her idea of letting loose on Friday, I do not even want to know what the rest of her week is like.” She smiled.

Kate noticed that Simone was blocking her line to the PopTV camera and that she kept coming up to her to make what she thought were snappy remarks. She also noticed that Simone had touched up her makeup and put her glossy black hair into a flattering updo. So, here was yet another person who couldn’t act natural in front of a camera. Because Simone’s niceness wasn’t natural in the slightest: Her true personality lay somewhere between casually snooty and downright bitchy.

Kate smiled, artificially bright. “I know, right?”

She was wondering how much longer they could pretend to like each other when she saw Gaby enter the restaurant, waving excitedly. She was wearing an extremely short skirt and a demure, long-sleeved top; the effect was nunnish above the waist and slutty below it. Kate wondered who’d thought up that bit of sartorial confusion. Gaby? Her new publicist? Or Madison, trying to be funny? Poor Gaby. Someone could tell her to go out dressed in tin foil and newspaper and she’d ask, L.A. Times or the Daily News?

“So,” Gaby said, mincing up to the bar on her platform heels. “You about ready to go for drinks?”

“Oh, gosh, I’d love to,” Kate said. “But I have to go home tonight and work on some songs. I’ve got studio time next week and I want to be prepared.”

The funny thing was, she and Gaby were going out for drinks tonight. But the PopTV producers were excellent at getting multiple scenes out of single locations, which saved them a lot of time and money and hassle.

“Oh, bummer,” Gaby said, twiddling a piece of her dark hair. “I wanted to go to that new club over on Vine.

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