Sammi smirked and nudged his shoulder with hers. “Bless your heart.”
The concert staffguy led Brinton backstage through a series of interconnected hallways painted in the same corporate beige. Eventually, they reached a door with a red-and-white sign and Jamie’s name thickly scrawled in black marker.
Inside, the makeshift greenroom was stocked with what Brinton assumed were items from Jamie’s rider: high-end bottles of whiskey, multiple coolers overflowing with beer and wine, and every packaged junk food imaginable, lined up on two long tables against the walls. Two plush gray couches with matching weighted blankets anchored the middle of the room.
A pair of brand-new iPads and a few fancy-looking swag bags sat on the nondescript black coffee table. Next to alighted vanity in the corner, in a display making any respectable It Girl swoon, there were two full clothing racks of designer T-shirts, jeans, sneakers, and boot options.
Brinton waited until the door shut behind her, then let the dam containing her tears falter. Back home, she called times like these “wet days.” When something stressful or overwhelming happened, and she was on the verge of a panic attack but it hadn’t quite materialized, the tears came more easily. She typically spent a wet day at home, rotting in bed, entombed in Cheeto dust and steeped in white wine. Certainly not in a crowd of tens of thousands of people.
The ground tilted beneath her feet. Her head felt like it was full of cotton. Why did she agree to visit Iris Grove with Jamie? She knew the concert was today. It was foolish to let him play so fast-and-loose with his schedule, presumably to impress her.
She roughly wiped her eyes with the back of her hand and peered into the lighted vanity mirror. Being in Iris—and being with Jamie—taught her that she was stronger than she thought.
She needed to believe it.
There was a knock at the door.
She expected Sammi, or better yet, Jamie. “Come in,” she rasped.
Rich popped his head in first. His stretched eyes seemed surprised to see her. “Oh—hey…”
A grenade detonated in her belly. “What are you doing here?”
“Nice to see you too. And I’m here becauseLandmarkis one of the festival’s sponsors. Or did you forget with all the fun you’re having down here?”
She stared at him blankly, wondering how he excelled at making a bad day astronomically worse. He closed the doorand plopped down on the couch, slapping a cushion beside him. Begrudgingly, she followed.
“I’m here with the social team to make sure we get enough content to cross-promote on the homepage,” he said. “But…I was hoping to run into you.”
“Oh?”
“Yeah. I agreed to let you skip the daily pitch meetings to write, but you stopped answering my emails. I need to know we’re on the same page, because I’m getting a lot of questions about the draft. I don’t like not having an answer.”
Brinton conjured a smile. “It’s going great. Truly. This morning, I interviewed his grandmother, and she gave me an exclusive about his late mom. I think it’ll?—”
“I’d like to read something soon.”
“We agreed my deadline is Tuesday. Three days from now.”
“We did. But how about you send something by the end of today? I’ll take a look and share feedback.”
“But—”
“Look, I’m trying to fight for you here, give you a shot to prove yourself. Isn’t that what you wanted?”
The tremors started in Brinton’s hands, an emotional earthquake that radiated through her chest and down her arms and legs. But she had to hold it together. If not for herself, for Jamie.
“Because Agatha’s got a killer pitch on deck. It’s nothing for me to text her?—”
Like hell he would.
“I’ll have it for you tonight.”
“Agatha’s a beast on deadline.” He laughed, rising from his seat. “It’ll be good for you to be under the gun.”
He plucked a frosty beer from the cooler, twisted off the cap, and took a long swig. “This could be a career-making piece. Oh, and don’t forget to have fun out there tonight.Sitting side-stage, and all this shit”—he gestured around the room with his free hand—“best perks of the job.”
The door slammed behind him.
