Copeland is better off than me? “I don’t think so,” Camille whispered to herself as she closed the extra window on her screen. No way was she going to let Kyra, of all people, have the upper hand. Tonya, Camille could understand. Her parents had money. Even Alexis might be understandable because she went back to college and finished her degree. But not Kyra. If that man-looking Kyra was making it in this world, living in a nice house, going on cruises, Camille didn’t have an excuse.
She slammed her headset on the desk. Took a look around her stupid, gray cubicle. Useless waste of the earth’s resources. She could still hear coworkers talking, still see through the cracks and smell when someone burned popcorn in the microwave. The only thing those partitions actually did for her was cover up tardiness.
But what did it matter if she was late? Who cares? As long as she came in and made her ten leads for the day to keep the manager away, what time she got there should be irrelevant. This whole job was stupid anyway.
Worse than this depressing train of thought was the fact that she actually needed this job to pay rent in an apartment she was too ashamed to have anyone visit. Maybe she shouldn’t have been ashamed of her place. I mean, at least she did have a roof over her head. Running water. Air-conditioning.
Her mother taught her to be grateful. Yet, Camille always figured the “grateful” thing was something you did on the way up. Like, if you had nothing and then, all of a sudden, you got rich, you were supposed to thank God for taking you from bad to good. She had a hard time showing gratitude after being robbed of the queen-of-pop-sopranos crown. Well, maybe that was taking it a little too far—like the time Whitney Houston said Bobby Brown was the king of R&B when, really, he wasn’t even on the radar.
Camille still remembered the day Sweet Treats’s last manager, Priscilla Longoria, called and gave her the news that Sweet Treats’s song had beat out Kelly Price, Dru Hill, and Toni Braxton for the number-one slot on the R&B charts. It was, to date, the best day of Camille’s life.
If she didn’t get something going, the best part of her life would always be in the past. What better day to start than her thirtieth birthday?
CHAPTER 3
This was probably a bad idea. Her hands shook as she waited for Kyra to answer the phone, if this was the real Kyra Copeland. Six degrees of separation had been reduced to three, thanks to a mutual Facebook friend. The whole thing was one big quirky coincidence. A coincidence that might change her life forever.
“Hello.”
“Hi, Kyra. It’s Camille.”
“Camille? How do we know each other?”
“Camille Robertson?”
“From Sweet Treats?”
Camille tried the we-go-way-back approach. “Yeah, girl, it’s me. How you been?”
“Fine. How’d you get my number?” Kyra’s cautionary pitch caught Camille by surprise.
“We have a mutual friend named . . .” Camille reviewed the screen. She didn’t realize she would have to reveal her source so soon. “Yolanda Wesley.”
“Oh.” Kyra’s voice fell. “She’s one of my husband’s cousins. She’s an author, always trying to build her fan base.”
“I ain’t mad at her,” Camille drawled.
“Well, I certainly am. What do you need or want or whatever?” she gushed with a sigh.
Apparently, Kyra had gained a few points in the thinking category. Camille couldn’t remember ever hearing Kyra string that many words together so fast without at least three takes in the studio. Camille would have to up her game.
“I was just sitting here reminiscing. Thinking about what a good thing we had going in the nineties. And yesterday, I was reading something in a magazine about Xscape, and you know we were way better than them. So—”
“Are you trying to put Sweet Treats back together again?”
Might as well cut to the chase. “Yes. That’s exactly what I’m trying to do.”
“Count me out.”
Camille gasped. “Why? Kyra, you were like . . . the voice of... sexiness in our group.”
“Please. You sang so loud and took over every song in concert. The audiences thought me and Tonya and Alexis were backup when we performed.”
“It’s not my fault that Priscilla put me front and center.”
“No, but it is your fault we broke up.”
Camille challenged, “How can you say that?”
“Because you made the decision to betray your brother and Tonya.”
“Betray is a very strong word, Kyra. Besides, Darrion was a free agent.”
“Oh my God, you’re still in denial,” Kyra accused. “Everybody knew Tonya had a thing for Darrion. He was pretty much her man.”
Hearing Kyra voice Darrion’s name suddenly jogged Camille’s memory. She’d almost forgotten about all those piddly details. Or maybe she’d blocked them out. Kyra hadn’t purged her files.
“That was a long time ago, Kyra. We’ve all grown and matured. I was hoping we could get past our differences and make a run for it again,” Camille said calmly, deeply, the way she imagined Maya Angelou spoke. Who could deny a seasoned black woman’s wisdom?
“You’re right,” Kyra agreed. “We should all be more mature now than we were then. Let the past stay there. Move on with your life, Camille. Sweet Treats is over.”
I’m losing her! “It doesn’t have to be, Kyra. We can do it again. Look at Tony! Toni! Toné! They’re still together. I just saw them on BET the other night.”
“I’m sure they still actually like each other because they’ve never messed one another over,” Kyra summed. “Let Sweet Treats go, Camille; the rest of us have.”
Camille sucked in her breath. “You all keep in touch?”
“Yes. Alexis and Tonya are still close. I talk to them from time to time. Alexis is teaching in St. Louis. Tonya’s back home in Houston, but she travels all over the country singing backup for Liza Sticcoli. We’re all happy, busy doing things we enjoy.”
Resentment flattened the smile Camille had been holding in place to enhance her pitch. So much for closing this deal. “Okay. Don’t say I didn’t ask you, Kyra.”
“No sleep lost here. More power to you, but don’t call me anymore.”
Camille held on to the phone for a second, hoping Kyra would say, “Psyche!” She used to pull that lame attempt at sarcasm so often, Camille had a pink and black T-shirt made for Kyra with the word applied across the chest.
No joke this time, though. T-Mobile brought the conversation to an official end with a soft beep in Camille’s ear. She couldn’t allow herself to process Kyra’s less than desirable response. The rejection rolled off Camille’s back like water on a duck. If there was one good thing she’d learned as a telemarketer, it was how to get over people’s negative reactions.
On to the next one. “Hi, Alexis. It’s me. Camille. From Sweet Treats.”
“Hey, Camille,” Alexis nearly sang. “How are you?” Alexis’s uniquely raspy speech always sounded like she needed to cough a few times. At their first rehearsal, Camille had been shocked by the strong alto hiding under the wobbly speaking voice.
So far so good. “Great! How are you?”
“I’m fine. So good to hear from you. What have you been up to?”
“Girl, just working, tryin’ to make it. You?”
“I’m good. Wow! I haven’t heard from you