Chapter Thirty-One #2
The solution arrived fully formed. “Come with me.”
Annie blanched, incredulous. “What?”
Lola moved closer, taking Annie’s hands, speaking fast. “Come with me. To London. Come for the whole thing. Stay with me. Come to set. I can even pay you! As my, I don’t know, assistant producer or something.”
Annie’s jaw had loosened, her eyes as huge as the London Eye. Her voice was soft. “Are you serious?”
“Yes!” Lola exclaimed, getting excited. She could see it. “Late summer in London is gorgeous. I’ll make them put me up in a suite at Claridge’s. We’ll eat crispy duck salad at the Ivy, go shopping at Harrods. High tea at the Ritz? Heaven. Oh, it’ll be so much better if you’re there!”
Annie cocked her head. “Like the premiere was better by me being there? Even though we were apart all night?”
Lola waved this off—a minor misstep. “I learned my lesson. I’ll tell Kimberly we’re a couple as soon as we get on the jet.”
“And what about the play?” Annie asked in a low voice. “What about Rhodes?”
“I know it’s far from ideal,” Lola said, “but I’ll cover the cost of every ticket and then some.
Maybe we can try again next summer!” Unlikely, given everyone’s schedules, but anything was possible, right?
“Look, you can’t make an omelet without breaking a few eggs and this is the chance to make an omelet fit for a queen! ”
There was a long, long pause. “And, in this instance”—Annie’s voice was cutting—“the queen…is you.”
Lola blinked, unsure.
Annie let go of Lola’s hands roughly, taking one, two steps away before spinning around. Her eyes glittered with rage. “Are. You. Kidding. Me?”
“Annie, I—”
“Are you fucking kidding me?” Annie screamed.
Lola swayed back in alarm. She’d never seen Annie look this mad.
“I would never, in a million years, for a billion dollars, abandon this town!” Annie shouted. “No, I don’t want to go to London with you as your assistant. Do you have any idea how patronizing that is?”
“I said assistant producer—”
“High tea at the Ritz? Crispy duck salad?” Annie laughed manically, even as her eyes filled with tears. “Have we met? I bring my own vegetarian lunch every day because I’m dead broke. Christ, I spent thirty bucks on that stupid dress last night and that was a splurge.”
Lola floundered, grasping for the right thing to say. “But you—looked great last night.”
“I felt great, until I arrived and realized I looked like Little Orphan Annie next to a family of Warbucks!” Annie exclaimed.
“Last night was awful. I’ve never been made to feel less consequential in my life.
Why would I want to go to London as your underling to feel that way for months?
I had a perfectly good life here until you came back into it! ”
Lola’s mouth was open, her shock making it hard to reason. “But…you said you had fun last night. Great conversations. Being in the center of the world.”
Annie gave an exaggerated shrug, lips pressed, eyebrows all the way up.
Something inside Lola broke. “You lied to me. Right to my face.”
“I was trying to protect you!” Annie cried, but her voice had taken on an edge of contrition. “I didn’t want you to feel bad on opening night!”
“By lying to me,” Lola said, now feeling some fury of her own. “Just like when we were kids. When you broke my heart and made me wonder what I’d done wrong for twenty years.”
“It’s not the same thing,” Annie exclaimed.
“Yes, it is! My trust issues are your fault and then you lied again after we promised to be honest. You haven’t learned a thing.”
“Have you?” Annie cried. “In case you’ve forgotten, you love doing this play.
You hate your life. You swore to me you’d choose being here over Hood!
The only reason you’d do this stupid film—another bad choice by the way—is for money and power and those are two of the shittiest reasons to do anything—”
“Enough!” Lola shouted, shaking with anger.
She stared at Annie, speechless over her lack of honesty, her lack of respect.
Maybe Kevin was right—maybe this was all a delusion. Vacation goggles. Summer fun. Maybe she was insane to think there was a future for her here. Annie lied to her.
The crossroads ahead of Lola blurred, each path equally right and wrong. Her pulse banged out of rhythm, her chest clenching like a fist. A panic attack, barreling at her with full force.
“I don’t trust you.” Lola stumbled, speaking on a gasp. “I have to get out of here.”
Without waiting for Annie’s response, Lola lurched out of the green room.
Back on the stage, the cast was mid-conversation.
“We’ve been talking,” Vicky began ostentatiously, “and we agree that you should—”
Lola’s panic whipped into fury, rising fast. “I don’t care what you think,” she snapped, voice edged with too many years of being managed and molded and misunderstood. “I’m in charge of my life, not anyone else.”
“Lols, dude, chill…” Dylan said, but Lola was already heading for the stairs.
“Let’s go,” she hissed to Jess, who obediently fell in step behind her. Vision blurring, Lola hurried up the theater aisle before she did something stupid like pass on the opportunity of a lifetime.
“So—that’s it?” Jazz called, her tone full of disbelief.
Lola paused at the doors, turning back one last time. “I’m sorry, everyone. I wish this wasn’t our end. I really do.”
The Rhodes Players stared back at her, aghast. Their expressions were enough to wobble her resolve.
But then Lola saw Annie on the edge of the wings, mouth tight, arms folded, face cold.
The face of someone she could no longer trust.
Lola’s heart shattered. It felt like forgetting how to breathe. To live.
Her agent was right. This was the start of everything. The end of everything else.
Lola’s voice broke as she addressed the cast. “Break a leg.”
Then she turned and walked out of the Rhodes Playhouse, not sure if she’d ever have the courage or will to return.