“When have I not been serious?” Asher asked.
The answer was never.
“Amos loved you. He watched a few of your songs on YouTube after you left, and he was sold.” Asher smiled to himself. “I never needed any convincing.”
“Holy fuck.”
“Sorry to drag you out of there. I didn’t want to tell you in front of all those people. You’re in Union Square, right?”
I nodded.
“I have a super-early shoot tomorrow for Rolex, so we’re going to take you home first. Is that okay?”
I nodded again, still in shock.
“Can I take you out to dinner Wednesday night? We can talk shop, and…catch up?”
He waited for my reply, hopeful eyes on mine as his fingers fidgeted with the thin chain around his neck.
“Sounds good,” I finally said, bringing a smile to his lips.
“And you’re going to need an entertainment lawyer for your deal,” he noted. “Do you want me to send you some names?”
I blinked at him, shock once again holding my tongue captive. His eyes scanned mine.
“Maggie…？”
I let out a grin.
“What’s so funny?” he asked.
“It’s weird. Weird to hear you call me Maggie.”
He leaned toward me, the city lights shining in his kind eyes. “Hey, Mags. I can’t wait to see what you do with this music. You’re going to blow us away.”
I beamed back at him, because I believed it to be true.
Later that night, after I let his cheek brush mine for a moment too long, I hopped out of the Escalade with my guitar case in hand and a huge grin on my face. I had gone to my own funeral and I had been resurrected—which was complicated for a Jewish girl.
I floated into my studio apartment, ignored the mess of cascading dishes on the kitchen counter, plopped onto my bed, and smiled at the ceiling like an idiot. Before I could wrap my head around tangible success, my phone pinged with an email from Asher: the contact information for four different entertainment lawyers. He made sure to note that they were “the best of the best,” but also explained that none of them repped him, so there would be “zero conflicts of interest.”
With a clear road ahead of me, I googled the only female lawyer on Asher’s list, seeing that she was listed as one of Variety’s top entertainment lawyers. With a widening smile, and with the paper cuts on my soul mending, I emailed her.
23
THIRTY-FIVE
I TUGGED MY ARMS INTO a pair of long blue gloves, sweating as I looked at the time on the broken microwave in my studio. Like the genius I was, I set my phone alarm for 8:30 p.m., which was of zero help to wake me up at 8:30 a.m. I was about thirty minutes away from officially running late for today’s gig: singing “Do You Want to Build a Snowman?” at a three-year-old’s birthday party inside New York’s glamorous event space, the Rainbow Room. I stood on my bed, which was the best way to get a good look at myself in the full-length mirror, and I haphazardly tugged on Elsa’s blond wig. The cape, the blue boots, the dress…I was a three-year-old’s dream.
I skipped down the stairs and opened the front door of my building, when suddenly, camera flashes blinded my eyes. Aggressive, sweaty men with loud voices and large lenses crowded my personal space.
“Maggie, how long have you been with Asher Reyes?”
“How did you meet Asher?”
“Maggie, is he in your apartment right now? Did he spend the night?”
“MAGGIE—”
I grew up envisioning what my eventual fame would be like, running through all the usual fame rite-of-passage scenarios: hearing my song on the radio for the first time, holding my Grammy as I thanked my dead dad, selling out Madison Square Garden. When I imagined what my first time being chased by the paparazzi would look like, I was not wearing a flammable Party City Elsa costume.
I shoved my way past the line of photographers, thrusting my body into oncoming traffic. A taxicab screeched to a halt behind me, and I glanced back as the driver held a labored honk and aggressively flipped me off. I twirled around and sprinted to the other side of the street, my blue cape flapping against a crowd of people bustling toward me, my wig now facing backward—a blond braid swaying in front of my horrified face.
I could see it yards ahead: the Fourteenth Street subway entrance. Relief took over as my blue boots found the stairs, leading my shaking body belowground—just as a smarmy man with a camera lurched into my face. Because I wasn’t born with the ability to just be a chill, suddenly famous person, I shrieked directly into the wide lens. The camera’s flash washed over me, memorializing me at my absolute best: jaw opened midscream, wild eyes of terror, and an Elsa braid cascading down the wrong side of my skull. I stumbled down the stairs with a ringing in my ears, my name getting louder behind me.
My MetroCard was buried deep in my purse, and I didn’t have time to fish it out. I took a running start and jumped over the turnstile, forever scarring a small child who pointed at me and screamed to her mother, “Elsa didn’t pay, Mommy!”
The R train screeched down the tracks as I tore across the platform, spinning into the subway car just as the doors opened—like a hot mess action hero.
My trembling body folded against the cold bucket seat. I dangled my head in between my legs, catching my breath, and before I had time to wipe the sweat off my lopsided wig, I realized that my lap was vibrating, incessantly. With my gloved hands shaking, I twisted my braid right-side-around and dug for my phone.
I arched my shoulders back, alarmed as I studied my buzzing phone. I hadn’t checked my cell all morning, not since I had overslept and given myself only fifteen minutes to emerge looking like a put-together princess. Missed calls and texts from every person I’d ever met were cascaded all over my lock screen, with links and question marks.
E! News: “Does Asher Reyes Have a New Leading Lady?”
Page Six: “Reyes Sets His Eyes on Unknown Singer”
Just Jared: “Get Yourself a Person Who Looks at You the Way Asher Reyes Looks at This Random Woman”
My chest pounded faster and faster until I got off the subway, hustling up to street level on Fiftieth Street, getting off one stop early, just to have access to better cell service. I pushed my way through a packed West Midtown as I buried my slack jaw in the heat of my phone.
I swiped through the surprisingly flattering, ethereal photos of myself onstage at the Bowery Electric, with Asher gazing up at me. In each photo, he looked at me the same way I looked at him, like there were thousands of unfinished love songs between us. My heart plummeted with the realization that these storybook images would soon be replaced with today’s photos of Hot Mess Elsa. I moved to click on The Cut’s article, “Asher Reyes Goes for a Normie—There’s Hope for Us All!” but a call from Summer flashed across my screen. I pulled the phone up to my ear.
“You are everywhere,” Summer said.
I barely let her finish. “Every-fucking-where.”
“Please tell me you had sex with him.”
“What? I didn’t have sex with him.”
“Restraint? That’s very unlike you.”
“What are you talking about? I overthink everything.”