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“No! No cameras! Just the song. I need to re-center myself and find my inner lake after this disaster. Someone liquify me!”
The music resumes its melodic lying, this time from the beginning. I check my phone to make sure it’s recording and hold it as close to the doorway as possible.
There’s no obvious sound or movement for over a minute. Everyone must be remaining deathly still as Jarvis recovers from the trauma of an incorrect milk ratio. In addition, my brain is now devoting way too many neurons to figuring out if seven-eighths plus two-eighths is that different from six-eighths plus one-eighth. If you have seven-eighths, take one away, add three to make nine-eighths, that’s really… I don’t know, but it definitely tastes exactly the same.
“What the frick?!” a voice shrieks directly beside me.
Uh-oh. I was so distracted by seventh-grade fractions I didn’t sense anyone approach.
I force an easy smile through the pounding in my ears. Are my hands shaking too? Hopefully not. I shove them (and my phone) in my pockets.
“Hey, I, uh, heard you needed a new beverage?” I say to the fuming country music star.
Jarvis looks ready to implode, and I straighten to my full height for the coming confrontation. I really hope Nash includes some colorful commentary about my bravery and commitment to the betterment of humanity in my eulogy.
“What the hell are you doing here?”
“Just stopped in to see if I could help. Did I hear something about an oat milk emergency?”
“How did you know we were here? Turn that damn music off!” he shouts into the other room.
The song screeches to a halt, and Jarvis directs his fury back at me.
“It was obvious,” I say, forcing myself to calm. “Filming a music video is a pretty big deal.”
“Yeah, but no one is supposed to know! It’s a secret.”
“Really? Why?”
“Because!”
I wait several seconds for the rest.
Okay. Guess that was it.
“Well, while I can’t argue that unshakable logic, I don’t get why you’re so upset. I just wanted to help.”
“Well, I don’t need your friggin’ help! How have you not gotten it by now, Valerie? Nobody needs you. Nobody even wants you. You’re a fraud and an embarrassment. You. Don’t. Belong. Here.”
I flinch, but manage to disguise how much that hurt.
“I see. So… I guess… good luck with the belt video?”
“Where do you think you’re going?!” he growls as I start for the door.
“You literally just told me you don’t want me here.”
“I don’t!”
“Right. So I’m going somewhere that isn’t here.”
“Like hell you are.”
I’m so confused.
I squint at him, hoping there will suddenly be captions floating across his forehead that’ll translate his brain for the rest of us.
Belts equal emblems.
