Page 74 of When I Picture You
She pulled Renee into a kiss, right there on the street.
Lola’s beanie slipped back as she tipped her head up. Her dark hair tumbled free.
“Should you get that?” Renee murmured.
She should, but she loved the way Renee was looking at her. Lola put her fingers lightly to Renee’s jaw, rose up on her toes, and kissed her again.
She didn’t think, at the time, that it had been so obvious.
21
As Lola drove away from Renee’s hotel, her lips were a little swollen from their goodbye. They’d restrained themselves in front of Lola’s driver, because NDA or not, no one should have to sit through excessive PDA. Alone now in the back of the SUV, Lola pulled her legs up to her chest. She waited for that familiar ache to announce itself—the feeling that she’d been ripped away from something warm and wonderful and might be left cold forever. That was how she’d felt after her weekends with Ava: still famished for affection, fearful that she’d never have it again, ashamed at being so needy.
But as they glided off the highway, the ache hadn’t come. She felt hungry for Renee, still, but there was none of that fear that this would be the last time. She knew it wouldn’t be.
The driver navigated the tight turns that led up the hill to Lola’s home, and Lola realized that she felt something else, something she hadn’t felt in a long time.
Lola left her bags by the door. The house felt big and empty—she’d asked Cassidy to make sure no one was there when she returned. She went directly to her studio, grabbed a notebook, and began to write.
HOURS LATER, LOLA’Sbrain felt wrung out, and her body sore from sitting so long. Dazed, she was surprised to see that it was already dark. She could not remember when she had last eaten. She shouldhave been exhausted from traveling, from writing so much, so fast—one song ready for Ackerlund, and the foundations of two more. But she wasn’t tired. She would crash soon—but not yet.
Come over?she texted.
Thought you’d never ask, Renee replied.
“WE CAN’T HAVEyou taking off like that. You had everyone scrambling. Poor Cassidy nearly had a panic attack, Micah’s hysterical about getting off schedule, and I don’t know where to start with the fallout from the premiere.” Gloriana’s face glowed on Lola’s phone.
Lola groaned internally. “The premiere was a week ago. I’m sure no one’s talking about it anymore.”
“They are, Lola. They’re saying that you saw Ava, so you abandoned your boyfriend on the most important night of his career.”
“The premiere ofFit to Livewasnotthe most important night of Nash’s career.”
“That’swhat you choose to respond to?”
Lola imagined the #LavaTruthers filming their TikToks, gleefully pinning new evidence to their conspiracy theory boards. Usually, such thoughts made her feel like her insides had been scooped out with a melon baller and plopped in wet red orbs on the floor. But now, she reached for that feeling, and it wasn’t there. The story the #LavaTruthers were weaving was none of her business anymore. Maybe it never had been.
“What do you want me to say?” Lola countered. “I did see Ava, and I did get upset. You should have warned me that she’d be there.”
“It was an oversight, and I apologize for that. But you have a job to do. You can’t run off like a scared little girl whenever you see her.”
Lola ignored how the accuracy of Gloriana’s description stung. Instead, she remembered how liberating it had felt when Renee gave her permission to leave the premiere. Renee and Claudia were right;Lola needed to push back on Gloriana more. She tried to borrow a bit of Renee’s self-assurance.
“I needed a break, and I took one. The press thinks I had Covid, and Cassidy knew where I was the whole time. It’s not like I was on some kind of drug spree. I was watching movies with Renee.”
Gloriana’s eyes narrowed ever so slightly at Renee’s name. “So busy watching movies with Renee that you ignored your calls and texts for five days.”
“There was no reception.”
“Or internet? People send emails from the top of Mount Everest, Lola. I’m sure that technology has made it to Michigan. You’ve taken plenty of time off in the last year, and you’ve always stayed available.”
Lola pressed her lips into a flat line. Gloriana knew that Lola hadn’t spent her recent time off doing anything that might have counted as rest and relaxation. She’d spent it crying on the couch or staring at the ceiling over her bed.
“I’m sorry you’re mad,” she said, in a self-assured tone that Lola imagined Renee would use.
“I’m not mad, Lola.” Gloriana shook her head. “What I am is disappointed.”
The words curled sickly in Lola’s gut. It had always been easy to see Gloriana as the figure that Lola’s real mother had never managed to be. When Gloriana had signed Lola as a client at the age of sixteen, Lola’s mother had been pushing her into any opportunity with a paycheck attached. It was Gloriana who introduced the concept of making choices that prioritized career longevity, who’d given Lola the strength to stand up to her mother’s self-serving demands to be part of her fame. Her whole career, Gloriana had been her bedrock. Lola had always been grateful for that, even if now, she felt like a child about to be sent to her room.
