Chapter Nine
Lyric Adair spotted in Cash Curran’s VIP suite at Portland Pathfinders’ game amid dating rumors
by Jaimie Xin
It looks like Cash Curran’s so-called Hail Mary of a play paid off!
singer made quite the bold statement by wearing a Pathfinders’ jersey, and not just any old one. The jersey Adair wore was
none other than one of Curran’s own. Adair was photographed cheering on her rumored beau alongside his parents, Eileen and
Jeb Curran. An insider close to Adair confirmed to People that this was not the first time the pop star met Curran’s parents, suggesting that the relationship might be more than a
casual fling.
Following the game, locals spotted the couple at a postgame victory party at xport lounge along with several other Pathfinders
players, family, and friends.
A source told People that Adair and Curran were extremely affectionate all night.
“I don’t think I ever saw them not touching,” the source said. “He’d have his arm around her, or she’d have her head on his
shoulder. Occasionally, they kissed, but they weren’t, like, excessive with the PDA. They just seemed really comfortable with
each other.”
Adair and Curran were seen leaving xport together shortly after midnight.
This most recent sighting comes two short weeks after Curran was spotted leaving the Hollywood Hills home of Rosaline Sinclair,
Adair’s publicist. He was photographed leaving with an unknown woman who has now been identified as Penelope Peterson, his
publicist and close family friend.
Adair is rumored to be hitting the stage at the World Music Awards for the first time in four years. The show will broadcast
live from the Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles on Sunday, October 21 at 8 p.m. ET on CBS and Paramount+. Whether or not Curran
will make an appearance has not been confirmed, though the next Pathfinders’ game is on Monday night, making his attendance
possible.
Representatives for the eleven-time Grammy winner and Super Bowl champion have yet to respond to requests for comment from
People.
Poppy would admit she was . . . moderately freaking out.
From what she’d gleaned through the grapevine and copious amounts of research, the work that would go into preparing for an
award show would normally follow a certain script.
If a client was an A-lister, or highly sought out, say if they’d recently been in a major box office film or just won a gold
medal at the Olympics, their publicist would reach out to preferred major media outlets weeks if not months in advance of
the show to prearrange interviews. The publicist would request questions in advance and vet those questions with the knowledge
that award shows were, by nature, unpredictable, and reporters could go off script.
If a client wasn’t an A-lister, if they weren’t nominated for an award, or if they were nominated in one of those unfortunate non-televised
categories, their dutiful publicist would put together a résumé of sorts, a single sheet with an easily digestible list of
their client’s accomplishments and accolades. These celebrities would usually show up early to the red carpet. Their publicists
would approach reporters and hand over their list of accomplishments and ask if the reporters were interested in interviewing
their client.
The big celebrities tended to show up late and would navigate the carpet strategically, either approaching outlets for their
prearranged interviews or deciding on the spot to say yes to an interested journalist knowing that whatever questions they
asked hadn’t been previously vetted.
Last year, Poppy had attended the ESPYS as Cash’s plus-one—his girlfriend at the time, Ashley, was away shooting a campaign
for The North Face in the Italian Alps. The World Music Awards wouldn’t be her first red carpet rodeo, but it would be her
first time attending one of this magnitude and as Cash’s publicist.
The night needed to go off without a hitch.
Only, the dance she’d expected suddenly had totally different steps.
In the roughly forty-eight hours since People magazine had posted an article linking Cash and Lyric and speculating that he might attend the WMAs, Poppy had received a
whopping 132 emails and 49 phone calls. Her inbox and voicemail were flooded with media requests and offers from practically
every major fashion house that made menswear to dress Cash for the show.
Lyric had already texted Cash a photo of the stunning canary-yellow satin gown she’d be wearing so they wouldn’t clash on the carpet.
Despite his fondness for luxury labels, when he could, he’d rather use his platform to bring attention—and business—to queer-owned fashion brands.
Poppy was already in contact with one of Cash’s favorite labels, trying to finagle expedited alterations.
That left the media requests. Poppy opened her text thread with Rosaline, reread the perfunctory back-and-forth conversation
they’d had discussing the logistics, including the private jet company Lyric used, Rosaline knowing it would be next to impossible
to book a commercial flight that left Portland after Cash’s practice and would arrive in Los Angeles in time for the awards.
She lingered on the brief text Rosaline had sent early Monday morning thanking Poppy for an excellent night.
If she had taken a screenshot of that text for posterity, that would remain between her and the private, locked folder she’d
saved it in.
She tapped at the screen and started to type.
Poppy (11:44 p.m.): Is Lyric doing press on the carpet?
Poppy (11:44 p.m.): My email inbox is flooded with media requests for Cash.
Poppy (11:44 p.m.): I know he’s attending as Lyric’s plus-one, so I don’t want to arrange or turn down anything without discussing it with you
first.
She didn’t want to step on Rosaline’s toes or for them to get their wires crossed.
Poppy (11:45 p.m.): United front, you know?
Poppy (11:46 p.m.): Are we instituting a moratorium on relationship questions if we do the press line?
Poppy (11:46 p.m.): I can’t decide if it would be silly not to address the elephant in the room or if it would be overkill. Show don’t tell . . .
??
Rosaline (11:54 p.m.): Poppy, are you planning on writing me the next great American novel in 140-character increments?
She cringed.
Poppy (11:55 p.m.): Maybe just the next great American novelette. ??
Poppy (11:55 p.m.): Sorry. I’m a little over-caffeinated.
Little being the understatement of the century.
Rosaline (11:56 p.m.): It’s nearly midnight. Stop drinking coffee and go to bed.
Poppy pouted at her phone.
Poppy (11:56 p.m.): Rude.
Poppy (11:56 p.m.): I asked you a question??
Rosaline (11:57 p.m.): I believe you asked me three.
She scrolled back up and counted.
Poppy (11:58 p.m.): One was obviously rhetorical ??
In the ten minutes it took Rosaline to respond, Poppy finished her iced chocolate macadamia nut breve from Dutch Bros. Her
third of the day. Ill-advised? Most definitely. Delicious? No doubt. But her emails weren’t going to reply themselves, and
if she couldn’t sleep after, there was probably some show with eighty-seven seasons on Hulu for her to watch.
Rosaline (12:08 a.m.): Lyric will be skipping the press line. I did promise a brief exclusive to Rolling Stone under the condition all questions
be about her album. I trust they know better than to pull any funny business.
She snorted.
Poppy (12:09 a.m.): You mean they know better than to fuck with you.
Rosaline (12:10 a.m.): Hey, you said it, not me.
Rosaline (12:10 a.m.): Obviously, it’s up to you if Curran does press, but I think you might be right about it being overkill. Always leave them wanting more is usually my motto.
Poppy (12:11 a.m.): Great minds ??
She might consider arranging an exclusive like Rosaline had for Lyric, but only so Cash could plug the LGBTQ+ youth sports
foundation he was starting here in Portland. No matter what, she’d be putting Cash through his paces, making sure he was prepared
for anything a red-carpet correspondent might throw at him. Better to be overprepared and underwhelmed than the alternative.
That was Poppy’s motto.
Poppy was in the middle of drafting a reply to Out magazine—they had a history of reporting favorably on Cash—when her phone buzzed against her thigh.
Rosaline (12:20 a.m.): What are you wearing?
Well, ho-ly shit.
Poppy smiled. Fuck email. Her night just got a lot more promising.
Her Taco Bell hot sauce pajamas were far from sexy, but that was easily rectified. She wiggled her shorts down her legs, kicking
them across the room, and unbuttoned the short sleeve matching top, leaving her in a pair of—well, they weren’t her best underwear,
but they were black and bikini-cut and maybe a little basic but inoffensive. And it wasn’t like they were going to stay on
for long.
She fluffed her stack of pillows—Cash gave her so much shit for sleeping with a veritable mountain of them and, oh my god this was not the time to be thinking about Cash.
She straightened her duvet, trying to make it look like she hadn’t spent the better part of the day working from bed, and attempted to arrange herself artfully across the covers with her shirt splayed open, revealing most of her stomach but still keeping her breasts covered.
She opened her camera, flipped it over to selfie mode, and held the phone up, trying to get as much of her body in the shot as possible while keeping her face out of it because she wasn’t a total moron.
She snapped a few pictures from a couple of different angles because options were always nice and then opened her gallery.
Maybe not the best near nudes she’d ever taken, but for a spur-of-the-moment photo shoot, not bad. They were . . . far from
artistically erotic. More tastefully slutty, exactly the vibe Poppy was going for. Why bother with pretense when they both
knew what was about to happen?
Before she could get too nitpicky and start tearing herself apart, finding flaws in the softness around her middle or her