20. Savannah
Twenty
Savannah
Richard had printed the headline.
Not the article. Only the headline, enlarged across a single sheet of paper and placed in the center of the conference table.
SAVANNAH brOOKS ADMITS SHE HURT MYSTERY WOMAN
Seven identical copies waited in front of the seven chairs.
“I’ve seen it,” I said.
Richard folded his hands.
“I wanted everyone looking at the same problem.”
Rachel turned her copy facedown.
Sophie had covered hers in notes, then crossed out so many of them that the paper had started to tear.
The conference room occupied the top floor of the label’s New York office. Glass walls. Long table. Expensive view. No visible place to hide from a difficult conversation.
Richard sat at one end.
I sat at the other.
Either symbolism or poor planning.
Two lawyers had joined us, along with Brent from marketing, who had spoken to me at least twenty times and still brought me coffee.
I did not drink coffee.
I moved the cup toward Rachel.
She accepted it without comment.
“We need to decide what happens next,” Richard said.
“Nothing.”
“That is not an option.”
“It was one of Sophie’s options.”
Sophie glanced at me.
“Technically, my option contained five words.”
“Very economical.”
Richard did not smile.
“The interview caused a forty-three percent increase in searches for your name.”
Brent leaned forward.
“Searches for the album rose nineteen percent.”
“Then congratulations. The crisis is converting.”
“This is not a joke.”
“No. The joke involved a turtle. This is a meeting.”
Rachel covered a cough.
Richard tapped the headline.
“You confirmed emotional involvement with an unidentified woman, admitted wrongdoing, and declined to define the relationship.”
“Yes.”
“That created ambiguity.”
“The situation was already ambiguous.”
“And your answer intensified it.”
“So would a lie.”
“No one is asking you to lie.”
Sophie shifted in her chair.
I looked at her.
She looked toward Richard.
That was enough.
“What are you asking me to say?”
Richard slid a page across the table.
The first paragraph thanked fans for their concern.
The second described Ellie as a private friend who had helped me during a short vacation.
The third redirected attention toward the tour.
I read it once.
“No.”
“It does not deny a relationship.”
“It calls her my friend.”
“A private friend.”
“That does not improve it.”
Richard leaned back.
“What language would you prefer?”
“None.”
“We cannot leave the story without direction.”
“We can refuse to direct it through someone else’s life.”
Brent glanced toward the lawyers.
They remained professionally blank.
“This statement protects her,” Richard said.
“Did she ask for that protection?”
“She is not in this room.”
“Exactly.”
Richard’s jaw tightened.
“This is becoming unnecessarily philosophical.”
“It is practical. No one defines Ellie. No one contacts her. No one issues a statement about her without her agreement.”
“Sophie has already agreed not to contact her.”
“Sophie has. I’m making the rule broader.”
Brent raised one hand slightly.
“What happens when journalists ask whether she is your girlfriend?”
“I decline to answer.”
“And if they ask whether you date women?”
The room changed.
Only slightly.
Enough.
I had been asked versions of that question for years.
What kind of man could handle my schedule?
Was I seeing the actor beside me at an awards show?
Had the latest song been inspired by whichever male singer had shared a stage with me that month?
The question always arrived with its preferred answer built inside it.
My team rarely corrected the assumption.
Sometimes we encouraged it.
A strategic seating plan.
A photographed dinner.
A headline neither side denied because both had something to promote.
“No more invented men,” I said.
Brent blinked.
Richard’s expression hardened.
“No one has invented a man.”
“You placed me beside Luke Harper at three events and gave photographers access to the second.”
“That was cross-promotion.”
“His team briefed him to laugh when someone asked whether we were dating.”
“Luke laughs at everything.”
“He is extremely committed.”
Sophie pressed two fingers against her forehead.
“No more suggestive seating plans,” I continued. “No anonymous sources claiming chemistry with whoever has an album or film coming out. No letting a rumor grow because it points people in a convenient direction.”
Richard looked at Sophie.
“Have we done that?”
“Not in exactly those terms,” she said.
“That answer should require legal representation.”
One of the lawyers looked down.
Possibly to hide a smile.
Richard ignored me.
“Public interest in your personal life is not something the label created.”
“No. We taught it where to look.”
“And what is the alternative? A public declaration?”
“No.”
“Then your objective remains unclear.”
“The objective is to stop feeding false assumptions without announcing truths that involve someone else.”
“That is a narrow path.”
“Yes.”
“And you expect everyone here to change a system while you are still deciding what you want.”
The room went quiet.
It was the first thing he had said that I could not dismiss.
“I am still deciding,” I said.
“Then perhaps you should wait.”
“Waiting is how I got here.”
Richard studied me.
I continued before I could make the answer prettier than it was.
“I spent years letting other people make these choices because I was relieved not to make them myself.”
Sophie looked up.
“I blamed the label, the press, the schedule. Those pressures are real. They were also useful.”
“Useful how?” Richard asked.
“They gave me somewhere else to put my fear.”
He leaned back.
“I am not interested in turning a complicated business into a personal revelation.”
“Neither am I.”
“It sounds remarkably similar.”
“I’m saying I participated. I agreed to the seating plans. I laughed at questions about men because correcting them felt harder. I let people use words like friend and assistant, then acted as though the language had nothing to do with me.”
Sophie’s eyes dropped to the damaged headline.
“I should have pushed back,” she said.
Richard turned toward her.
“Sophie.”
“She’s right.”
“I am not assigning blame.”
“I am,” Sophie said. “Some of it belongs to me.”
“This is not productive.”
“It could become productive,” Rachel said, “if we stop pretending the current arrangement works.”
Brent looked as though he regretted arriving before the coffee had gone cold.
Richard tapped the page once.
“This entire conversation is happening because Savannah met someone for four days.”
“No,” I said.
He stopped tapping.
“This is happening because I lost someone after three years and still found a way to repeat the pattern.”
Claire’s name remained unspoken.
It did not need help entering the room.
Richard looked toward the windows.
“We have contractual obligations.”
“I’ll meet them.”
“The remaining tour dates?”
“I’ll perform every show.”
“The expanded-edition promotion?”
“I’ll promote it.”
“Press?”
“The appearances already contracted.”
“And discretionary opportunities?”
“No.”
Rachel looked at me.
Sophie stopped writing.
Richard turned back.
“That is not reasonable.”
“It is exactly what discretionary means.”
“You have an awards appearance next month.”
“Not contracted.”
“It is valuable.”
“Then it should have been scheduled before eleven months of touring.”
Brent opened his mouth.
Richard raised one hand.
I unlocked my phone and opened the calendar.
“My last full day off was eight weeks ago.”
“You went to Florida.”
“I hid in Florida. That was not company-approved rest.”
Rachel took the phone and scrolled.
“This travel day is marked as off.”
“I spent nine hours on planes.”
“You had a fitting that evening.”
Richard looked at her.
“Why was a fitting scheduled on a rest day?”
“For the awards appearance,” Rachel said.
“The valuable one,” I added.
He ignored that.
“We can adjust future schedules.”
“I’m adjusting this one.”
I turned the phone toward them.
“The awards appearance comes out. The magazine cover moves or disappears. After the final show, I take five days without press, meetings, fittings, or studio sessions.”
“Five days?”
“Yes.”
“You have momentum.”
“I also have a pulse. We should diversify.”
Rachel made a choking sound into her water.
Richard stared at me.
“The label has invested heavily in this tour.”
“And the tour succeeded.”
“We need to build on that success.”
“We will. Five days later.”
“You cannot disappear whenever something becomes uncomfortable.”
The sentence reached closer than he intended.
“I’m not disappearing.”
“You are canceling appearances because of Ellie.”
“No.”
He waited.
“Ellie made it impossible to keep pretending the schedule was sustainable,” I said. “That does not mean I’m changing it for her.”
Richard looked unconvinced.
That was fine.
I had spent too long treating agreement as permission.
“I want a written press policy,” I said.
Sophie picked up her pen.
Richard remained still.
“What policy?”
“No statement about a private person without their approval. No fabricated romance as a distraction. No direct contact with anyone in my private life unless both of us agree.”
“And live interviews?” Sophie asked.
“No surprise personal questions.”
“That cannot always be guaranteed.”
“Then we decide whether live is worth the risk.”
“That will reduce bookings.”
“Yes.”
She considered the list.
“That is restrictive.”
“Is it workable?”
“Yes.”
Richard looked at her.
“You support this?”
“I support having rules before Savannah invents them while a camera is running.”
“That sounds hostile,” I said.
“It is affectionate.”
“Everyone has developed an unusual method.”
Richard unfolded the proposed statement.
“We are not issuing this.”
“Good.”
“We will say the interview speaks for itself.”
Sophie nodded.
“No further details.”
“No anonymous clarification,” I said.
Richard looked offended.
“I do not authorize anonymous clarifications.”
Brent became intensely interested in the grain of the table.
Richard followed my gaze.
“Something you would like to contribute?”
“No.”
“Excellent.”
The meeting ended twenty minutes later.
Not because anyone felt satisfied.
Richard had another appointment, and I had stopped providing new things for him to reject.
Legal collected the unused drafts.
Brent left without his coffee.
Rachel took that too.
Sophie stayed behind, gathering pages into the navy folder.
“I’m sorry,” I said.
“For the interview or this meeting?”
“Both.”
“The interview was partly my fault.”
“You gave me five words.”
“You turned them into several paragraphs.”
“I became enthusiastic.”
“You became nationally quotable.”
She clipped the folder shut.
“I should not have called Claire wardrobe.”
Her name landed softly.
“No.”
“I thought if I made the explanation boring, people would stop looking.”
“They didn’t.”
“No.”
She met my eyes.
“I was protecting the campaign.”
“I let you.”
“That does not absolve me.”
“It doesn’t.”
Sophie nodded.
“I’ll draft the policy.”
“Thank you.”
“Do not make me regret supporting it.”
“I can offer no such assurance.”
“That is what concerns me.”
She left.
Rachel waited until the door closed.
“Five days?”
“I panicked.”
“You could have asked for seven.”
“I’m new to boundaries.”
“We’ll build gradually.”
She handed me my phone.
A message from Ellie waited on the screen.
Saw the new headlines. Are they issuing anything else?
I looked toward the closed conference-room door.
Me: No follow-up statement. No one will contact you. If that ever changes, I’ll ask first.
I added:
You don’t need to answer.
Then sent it.
Rachel watched me place the phone facedown.
“You’re not going to stare at it?”
“I am.”
“You turned it over.”
“So I can stare with dignity.”
She sat beside me.
“What will you do with the five days?”
“Nothing.”
“That is not an activity.”
“It may be advanced.”
“Where?”
“I had not considered that far.”
“Pelican Key?”
“No.”
Rachel looked surprised.
“She hasn’t invited me.”
“That is unusually sensible.”
“I have occasional episodes.”
The phone buzzed.
I turned it over.
Ellie: Good. Thank you for telling me.
Nothing else.
No invitation.
No affectionate reward for improving the rules that should have existed already.
I typed:
Of course.
Deleted it.
Me: You’re welcome.
Then I put the phone away.
Rachel opened her calendar.
“I’m blocking the five days before someone discovers them.”
“Use a threatening title.”
“Medical recovery?”
“Too dramatic.”
“Personal commitment?”
“People move those.”
She typed for a moment.
“Unavailable?”
“Will that work?”
“No idea. We have never tried it.”
She turned the screen toward me.
Five empty days appeared after the final show.
No interviews.
No fittings.
No meetings.
Nothing waiting to become urgent.
The space made me nervous.
I left it there.