you dick.
As we’re standing there staring at each other, I realize there is a point in most fights when a yawning chasm opens up, and you realize what you thought was a mere crack is actually a deep crevice. That’s where we are now: standing on our opposing edges, looking down. Except this time that crevice had become the Grand Canyon, and I had no idea what had caused the earth to open so widely between us. I start thinking about this morning, when the only thing more unthinkable than staying with JR was leaving him. Now the only thing more unthinkable than leaving is staying. I grab my phone and my bag and walk right out the door. The door slams behind me, cutting Zelda off, midbark.
I’m shaking as I get out onto Hudson Street. I unlock my phone and go to favorites, clawing at Gemma’s name on the list. “Ge-Ge-Gem …?” I sputter into the phone. “Meet me at T-t-t-tortilla Flats. Mama needs a drink.”
My head is pounding. From the tequila, from the fight with JR, from the shrill voice of my boss, Maryann, who’s interrogating me, and rightly so.
“Why did you take your shirt off in the Boom Boom Room?! You shouldn’t even be in the Boom Boom Room at four o’clock in the morning—that’s when you’re supposed to be arriving here for work!”
I say nothing. She turns to her boss, the general manager of the station.
“Am I right, Joe?”
Joe’s got a presence as intimidating as his gut is big. He doesn’t look like he’s missed a meal in all his fifty-odd years. Sarah, the head of HR, is here too, but luckily she keeps pretty quiet and just dutifully takes notes. For the past hour, the other two have been taking turns with their jabs and rhetorical questions, which is making me dizzier than I already am. It’s like a Jack Bauer-style interrogation from 24. I’m waiting for one of them to whip out a pocketknife and start stabbing me in the thigh to get me to talk. I’m nauseous—have been for two days. I can’t remember the last time I was this hungover. My brain feels like a sponge left out in the sun to harden and fry. And my back—god, how my back hurts.
“Am I right, Guiliana? You called out sick but weren’t sick at all—is that correct?”
I don’t answer.
“Eric announced to our one million viewers that you were out sick and now there’s a goddamn video of you on Banter … in your neon-pink bra?” I hate how she emphasizes neon-pink, like she’s the fashion police. Joan Rivers and her Joan Rangers would have a field day with Maryann’s gray suit and ill-fitting pink button-down shirt.
Joe subs in while Maryann catches her breath. “Do you know how bad this looks for you … for us? You know I had a lady from Brooklyn write in and ask if she could send some chicken noodle soup to the station for you? She had her goddamn nephew write the email for her. Jesus, Guiliana.”
In my head, I’m watching a Polaroid take shape. First, an outline of my body, then slowly my jeans come into focus, followed by the pale white of my stomach. My face remains a blur, covered by a brush stroke of yellow. Oh wait, that’s my raggedy-ass T-shirt covering my face for two seconds before I toss it on the bar next to me. I vaguely remember a guy telling me he was a big fan, and asking to take a picture … did he ask me to say hi to the camera? Maybe Gemma knows. I gotta get out of there and call Gemma. I also need to call my mom, my agent, and my brothers. They’ve all called me at least three times in the past twenty-four hours, and I’ve ignored every single call. I just don’t know what to say—or rather, I’m too scared to say it out loud, because when I do, then it will mean it’s true.
At least I don’t have to waste time telling Angel. Forget that Banter is his homepage and that he follows them on Twitter. Out of the corner of my eye I saw him walk by a minute ago, so he’s very much downloaded on the situation now. So I’ll start with Mom—she’s the easy one. I’ll cry, she’ll cry, then we’ll make plans for her to come down from Connecticut and take me out for some retail therapy. Then I’ll get her to tell Dad for me, because he’s going to be the tougher one. Hopefully Mom softens that blow a little bit for me. I can’t tell Richard and Adam yet because they’re going to want to come and kill JR, just as any good brothers would. Though if Gemma tells Luke everything, then that may be a moot point. Either way, I’ll wait on them. I do need to get my agent Jason on the phone before he loses his mind. But first, I have to get out of this office. From inside my bag on the floor, I can hear my phone vibrating against my tin of lip balm like it’s about to explode. As I think about the volume of emails, texts, and calls I have to return, the nausea pains start to feel like a boa constrictor wrapping itself around my stomach, suffocating its passageways, wanting to kill me.
And they’re still berating me.
“Are you even listening to us?”
I nod.
“Last time Banter wrote about you and JR pitching a reality show to the cable networks, it took us a month to stop the swirling rumors that you were leaving NYNN. Wasn’t that enough?”
I nod again and try to look as sorry as possible. Not that much of a stretch.
“What happened? You need to be the star of the blogosphere again? What do you have, attention issues?”
Attention issues? ME? I wish I could slap Maryann right out of her ugly pointy-toe kitten heels for that low blow. Bitch. If she only knew what had happened to me and why I was so upset. Obviously she didn’t watch the Banter video or she would have heard me say, right before I took my shirt off, MY FIANCÉ IS FUCKING HIS ASSISTANT!
“Yes, you’re right. What happened last night will never happen again.” Of course it won’t because a) I’m never drinking alcohol again, and b) I’m never leaving the house without wearing seven layers of hard-to-unzip clothing, and c) I’m never going to find out that JR was sleeping with his assistant again because I’m never going to see JR again, period.
But it’s not the time for indignation. I take a big gulp of the tension-filled air and offer up a solution. “How about this: I know a few people over at Banter. Why don’t I call one of them and see if they’ll take the post down?”
Actually, I don’t know anyone over there. Eric might, but I sure don’t. Even if he does, no way they’re going to take it down. Media mogul Jake Spears created that site for one thing and one thing alone: pageviews. And let’s be honest, after the New York Toast tagged me the city’s “Trans-It Girl,” they’ve been after me. This story is gold for them—they got a whole month’s worth of clicks in one week when someone started an anonymous Tumblr about my outfits called What the Fuck Is Guiliana Layne Wearing? Now they reblog it every day with their own set of jabs Photoshopped in a font that looks like a kid scribbling in white crayon. (The latest, from last week when I wore what I thought was a cute neutral-colored jumper: “We all love to be comfortable at work, but puke-colored khaki pajamas—really, Guiliana?”) I have a feeling this plan I’ve devised is going to be about as successful as busting a Uey right before the tollbooths to the Verrazano Bridge, but offering to call and get this video taken down is all I can do to get out of this war zone before I throw up on my bosses.
The three head honchos exchange looks and whispers as I try to quiet the bass still thudding away in my head. Unce, unce, unce. If they only knew what JR did to me. That my family is broken. That I’m broken. And homeless. Even though I’m crashing with Gemma and she says I can stay as long as I want, let’s be real. I’m sharing her body wash and toothpaste and I’m even wearing her clothes. I glance down to my yet-to-be-released Rachel Crow ensemble. On any other day I’d be ecstatic to have this glamorous look from stylist to the stars–cum–fashion designer on, defining me as a major trendsetter—but today it only means one thing. My life is a mess.
Unce, unce, unce.
“Okay, Guiliana, this is your last chance—one more negative Banter item about you, one tweet with your name and something unsavory and unrelated to the traffic,