Chapter 22
Iknew the video from You Oughta Know wouldn’t die, but that didn’t stop me from hoping.
Unfortunately, hope wasn’t enough. The video is viral, the online narrative changing right before our eyes from happiness and hopefulness about a reconciliation between Bailey and River to the idea that this was all a PR setup.
It’s on every platform, and it’s hit every entertainment site. Prominent PR influencers, like Molly McPherson, are doing full breakdowns.
It is, in a word, stupid.
There are other words, but I can’t say them right now, not when we’re in the Silverline conference room trying to figure this out.
Luke and I discussed possibilities on the drive here and hit a dead end with every one of them.
If we deny it, we look guilty. If we confirm it .
. . well, we would never do that. Because it’s not true, and also because it would make things so much worse.
And if we ignore it, the narrative will just keep going.
So, in summary, we’re screwed.
The conference room door opens, and Victoria walks in by herself, no Paul trailing in after her. She takes a seat at the head of the table, even though it’s just Luke and me. River and Bailey are filming, but even if they weren’t, I don’t think they’d be part of this.
We met with them earlier. Bailey was anxious and kept saying how unfair it all was. River has been doing the fame thing longer, so his thought was that we should let it lie and it would pass.
That’s always a possibility, but this doesn’t feel like something that will just go away. People don’t like to feel duped. It’s a betrayal of their trust.
The one positive is that they were a united front, sitting together, holding hands while we talked to them.
The relationship, it seems, is still hanging in there.
It’s only been a few days in the making, but the way they looked at each other—and were each other’s support system, backing each other up while we talked—made me want to root for them.
Not to mention, if they broke up now, that would be really bad. It would make this look exactly like what people are accusing us of.
And Luke and I are included in that “us.” Someone took the time to find out who was managing Bailey’s and River’s PR and posted our names and the firms we work for. So that was fun. Luckily, most people don’t care about the people pulling strings—they just care about the people dangling from them.
“Let’s begin,” Victoria says. She puts on her glasses and picks up the piece of paper she brought with her, studying it for a minute before looking at Luke and then at me.
“Well, this is a mess,” she says, not mincing words. Not that I expected her to, because she never has before. “Do we have a plan?”
I look at Luke, my eyes saying You tell her.
“We’re working on it,” he says. “We’re not sure of our plan of attack quite yet.”
“We will need something by the end of the day,” she says. “I don’t really care how you fix it. I just want to make sure this doesn’t spiral.”
I want to point out that it’s already spiraling but decide that’s probably not my best move.
“Any questions?” she asks.
Both Luke and I shake our heads.
She gets up from her seat and walks out of the room without even a goodbye, her Louboutins clicking on the floor as she leaves.
“Well, that was fun,” Luke says. He swipes a hand down his face.
“Yes, a really great time,” I say.
“It’s Friday. What can we possibly do that won’t get buried over the weekend?”
“We need to be fast,” I tell him. “We can’t fix this today, but maybe there’s something we can do to slow the damage.”
An hour later, we have a plan. And it’s a boring one. But hopefully boring enough to work.
The studio will release a statement. It will be basic—saying that the studio is focused on the continued production of season four of the show and that they are excited for fans to experience what’s ahead.
This will fix nothing. But that’s not our goal. The hope is that fans will be annoyed with the boring statement and focus on that, slowing down the attention on the PR-stunt narrative. Basically, we’re trying to buy some time.
We run it by Victoria, and she approves it.
“I want the real plan by Monday,” she tells us before we leave her massive office with floor-to-ceiling windows that face the Burbank hills.
We spend the next hour crafting the statement before sending it off to Victoria. She tells us it works and has it sent out through Silverline’s official channels.
By the time we leave the studio, it’s already making the rounds. And now we just have to hope it does what we need it to.
We’re both quiet as we start the drive home, stuck in stop-and-go traffic on Alameda. We probably should be brainstorming, figuring out what we could do on Monday, but I think we’re both mentally exhausted. The plan right now is to meet up this weekend and work on it.
“Oh, shoot,” I say when I realize what day it is.
“What’s wrong?” Luke asks from the passenger seat.
“Nothing. I just realized I was supposed to go to my parents’ house for dinner tonight.”
My mom called on Wednesday to see if I would be at dinner on Friday and said it was really important that I be there. I didn’t put much stock in it because she’s said that before, and one time it turned out she just wanted to show me the new rose garden she’d planted in the backyard.
There was also the time she had something important to show me and it was her new crafting room, which happened to be my old bedroom. That one stung a little.
The woman has cried wolf one too many times.
“You should go,” Luke says. “I can just take an Uber from your parents’ house.”
I sigh, keeping my eyes on the road. “No, I’ll take you home and then come back.”
That’ll be an hour and a half round trip. I’ve done worse things on a Friday night.
“We’re already in Burbank,” he says. “Don’t your parents live here?”
“Yes, but it’s fine. Maybe I won’t even go. I’m not really in the mood.”
“You should go.”
“Why don’t you come with me?” I ask, the words falling out of my mouth before I’ve thought them through.
You idiot, Claire.
My brain really is fried. Luke coming to my parents’ house for dinner is a bad idea. What would Gigi say? My mom? She’d embarrass me for sure. Ryan and Sienna? They’re fine. They’d be the most normal part of this. But what about my dad and his lobster mitt? No, this is a terrible idea.
“Never mind, you don’t want to do that.”
Luke laughs. “Arch, did you just invite me to dinner and then rescind the offer before I’ve even had a chance to answer?”
“Yes, but my family’s a lot,” I say, looking over at him for a second before looking back to the car in front of me as we inch along the road.
“Aren’t all families?”
“Good point,” I say.
“So . . . am I coming?” he asks, after a couple of beats of silence where I’m having a slight panic attack.
“Do you . . . want to?”
“I’m not gonna lie: this might be the worst dinner invite I’ve ever had,” he says.
I laugh. “I’m sorry. Okay, let me do this right. Would you like to come to dinner with my family?”
“Hmm. Let me think about it.”
“Luke,” I chide.
“Will they care?”
I shake my head. “No. They always make way too much food. I’m sure Gigi would love to see you again.”
And now I’m thinking about what Gigi might do. The woman is a wild card.
“Okay,” he says. “I’d love to come to dinner with your family.”
I get off Alameda as soon as I can and head toward my parents’ house, feeling apprehensive and, honestly, a little sick to my stomach.
I couldn’t try to take back the offer again, could I? No. I’m stuck now.
It only takes us five minutes to get there, and it feels like my heart is going to race out of my chest as I park and we get out and walk toward the door of the ranch-style home with the white siding and painted black shutters.
“So this is where Claire Archer grew up,” Luke says as we approach the door, an appreciative smile on his face.
“Yep, this is it.”
I take a breath before opening the door and walking inside.
Luke follows me through the kitchen and living room and out the patio doors, where we find my mom, Gigi, Ryan, and Sienna all sitting at the wooden outdoor dining table, my dad at the grill with his back to us.
They all fall silent when they see us.
“Claire?” my mom asks, standing up from her seat, a confused look on her face.
“Hello,” I say, waving at my family. I’ve literally never greeted them with a “hello” in my life.
“Who’s with you, Claire-Bear?” my dad asks. He’s turned toward us now, tongs in one hand and a lobster mitt in the other, wearing his “License to Grill” apron.
Oh gosh.
“Everyone, this is Luke,” I say. “And, Luke, this is everyone. My dad, mom, brother Ryan and his girlfriend Sienna. And you remember Gigi.”
“How could I forget Gigi?” he says, a smile on his face as we walk closer to the table.
Gigi looks up at him from her seat, shading her eyes with her hand. “I’m hard to forget. Come have a seat by me, Luke,” she says before turning to Ryan, who’s currently occupying the seat next to her. “Move it, kid.”
Ryan laughs as he and Sienna get up and move two seats over so Luke can sit next to Gigi and I can take the one next to him.
“Sorry,” I whisper to him as we sit down.
“For what?” Luke leans toward me, whispering back.
“Just . . . it’s a preemptive sorry,” I say.
“So, Luke, how do you know Claire?” my mom asks.
“They work together,” Gigi answers for him, looking at my mom like she’s new here.
“Right,” my mom says. “At Hero & Fitch?”
“It’s Harrow & Finch, Mom,” I say. She’s never gotten the name right. “And no, Luke used to work there. He works for another firm now.”
“Okay, that’s ringing a bell,” my mom says. “I remember you talking about a Luke before.”
Luke turns to me, the corner of his lip pulled up. “You used to talk about me?”
“No,” I say, shaking my head. “They’re all delusional. Totally crazy.”
“She did. And I met him once at a company party. I remember his shoulders,” Gigi says. “And they still look nice, very sturdy.” She reaches over and pinches his shoulder with her bony hand.