Page 20 of Wish You Knew
I should have taken Saff up on her offer of dinner.
I should have left when Mat asked me to.
I should have left when Rosie messaged me.
The third realisation was the one which hit home.
Now all that was left was a heap of regret and a really nasty taste in my mouth. I wasn’t even kidding. The sour taste of drink, drugs and vomit swirled around, making me retch again. I reached for one of the bottles of water which had thoughtfully been placed on the bedside table and gulped the whole thing down in one.
I unearthed my phone from the pile of clothes on the floor. Dead. Needed charging. Where the fuck was the charger? I focused on the room and spotted my bag on the floor by the wardrobe. I never bothered unpacking in hotels when we only stayed one night. Dragging my sorry arse across the room, I found the charger and plugged the phone in.
A flurry of messages pinged up on the screen. Mostly from the band’s What’s App group celebrating the success of our set, several from a number I didn’t recognise - which I guessed may have been Talia, given the suggestive nature of the content, although it was entirely possible I’d given my number out to any number of women given the state I’d been in - and the usual ones from management after a gig.
Nothing more from the one person I wanted to hear from.
Switching the device to silent and leaving it across the room, well away from me, I slunk back to the bed and cocooned myself in the duvet.
Everything could wait.
Right now, I needed to sleep.
10
Rosie
TheAspirecasting took place at their offices off of Carnaby Street. I loved this part of London, always so vibrant and ever changing, which was why I’d got there early to grab a takeaway coffee and sit to watch the world go by for a while.
Idly, I read one of the gossip sites I infrequently checked for stories about myself. Indulgent? Narcissistic? Egotist? Probably. It wasn’t something I did often, and also allowed me to check in on some of my friends and alert them to anything which looked dodgy. Saff, for instance. The minute I opened it up, my stomach sank.
The headline story featured Scott falling out of a club with a black-haired woman I didn’t recognise. The date was from a couple of nights ago - the evening of the Brixton gig.
I shouldn’t have been surprised, but I didn’t expect the jealousy to burn quite as deep as it did.
I stared at the photograph. He looked wasted.
What was I doing?
He had plenty of opportunities to be with me that night, yet he’d chosen to turn them down and do his own thing.
He clearly wasn’t interested in me.
With a sigh, I shut down the site and checked the time. Only a few minutes until the casting atAspire’soffice, I headed to their building.
The reception was a light, airy space, similar to most other office buildings. Framed photographs of various front covers were hung up on the walls, cataloguing their most successful issues. Maybe one day I’d get my own cover.
“Hi, I’m here for the casting?” I said to the receptionist.
“Take a seat.” She gestured to where two other girls were already waiting.
I never got used to seeing women so similar to me. The same blonde hair, similar height, build and weight. Obviously they wanted a certain look, and I wasn’t the only one who had it. We nodded at each other as I sat down next to them. One of them definitely looked familiar and I’d been up against her for other jobs, which she’d ended up getting. Already, my chances seemed slim.
The woman I recognised as the magazine’s fashion director approached me, resplendent in a pair of navy capri pants, a floaty, printed blouse in similar tones, and matching kitten heels.
“Hey, Rosie, good to meet you.”
Fuck, I wished I’d made more of an effort. In comparison, my dark jeans and simple black t-shirt paired with a forest green blazer seemed uninspiring, dull even.
They were looking to cast for a vintage day-to-night spread, and the fashion director had definitely got the message. I should have heeded it myself.
