Beautiful People - Chapter 20: Chapter 20

Vera stood in the shade of Carmen's porch, sweating through her crochet top, and took a deep breath.
"Technically, you haven't done anything wrong," she reminded herself, but she wanted nothing more than to turn around, get back in the car, and go home to Sharise. Instead, she took another deep breath and held it for a count of six. She wasn't going to run away from this.
She rang the bell. No one answered.
Frowning, she thumbed her phone unlocked. Nothing from Carmen since her call. The sleek red sports car was parked under the tree out front, but that didn't mean she was home--Jasper could have taken her somewhere. She rang the bell again, then knocked. She thought about checking if the door was unlocked, but she was pretty sure that would count as trespassing or something. If she was about to be fired, she didn't need to get arrested, too.
She texted Carmen, I'm here, where are you?
Carmen replied immediately: By the pool obviously. Grab a drink on your way in.
"Oh, yeah, obviously," Vera muttered. Grab a drink? Was this some game Carmen was playing, like when Vera first arrived and she pretended not to know her?
The door was, in fact, unlocked, so she slipped out of her new, simple white sandals, calves whining as they stretched, and tiptoed down the hallway lined with all the tasteful nudes in primary colors. A deep hush seeped through the bright, spacious rooms. She didn't touch the fridge, but paused in the kitchen to peer out at the pool she had admired on her first day here, shimmering cerulean water even more alluring now in the searing afternoon heat.
Wearing a loose linen cover-up and a floppy hat that shadowed her face, Carmen lay stretched out on a lounger by the pool. She was alone.
Vera had half-expected Sharise to be here. The empty house knotted unease in her throat, but maybe it was better for her dignity to have this confrontation without any witnesses. It would give her more time to figure out how to explain this to Sharise.
At the swish of the patio doors, Carmen glanced up from her phone and hooked her round gold sunglasses off her nose. "You forgot to grab a drink."
"I'm not thirsty, thanks," Vera said, smoothing out a pleat in her skirt.
Carmen smiled at her, white teeth flashing in the sun. "You're not gonna make me drink alone, bitch." Ice clinked in her fluted glass as she gestured widely with it, slopping water over her wrist in the process. "Oops." Giggling, she licked drops off her golden skin.
A little muddled by Carmen's disarming ease when she had expected anger, Vera frowned. "Why did you ask me to come over?"
"We're celebrating." Carmen tossed long glossy curls back over her shoulder.
"Celebrating what?"
"Me starting my next project, and you getting to work with Andre, duh." Carmen looked at her like she was stupid. "You're welcome, by the way. I told him to call you."
"Yeah," Vera said slowly, now even more confused. If Carmen was planning to fire her, this was a really bizarre way to do it. "I know. Thanks."
Carmen frowned. "What? Why do you look like you're gonna throw up?" She let out a small gasp. "Did Andre not end up hiring you?"
"No, we had a great meeting. He's awesome, and I signed him. I just--" She studied Carmen, trying to find some tell, a twitch of her lips or quiver of the lashes that would make it clear Carmen was playing with her. Carmen just took a long sip from her glass, which Vera realized belatedly was probably not, in fact, water. Finally, she spread her hands and tried to get this over with. "On the phone you sounded like you wanted to bitch me out."
Carmen wrinkled her smooth brow in exasperation. "Oh my god. Is the stress of the LA lifestyle making you paranoid? Now I know you need a drink. I'm having vodka, but there's wine and there might still be some beer that Troy left-- what do you like?"
Vera crossed the hot stone patio and perched on the lounger next to Carmen's. The bitter tang of vodka stung her nose from here. Maybe she was paranoid. "Bitch, you called me up in the middle of the afternoon and told me to get my ass over here. I wasn't prepared to get daydrunk. I still have work I'm supposed to do this afternoon."
"I don't care. Take a selfie with me, your followers would like that." Carmen pouted prettily, and Vera wondered if she'd gotten injections recently. "Come on. Lighten up. Chill. I wanna hang out. Sharise is busy today and I'm not on set until next week and I'm bored. You can take a day off."
Confusion gave way at last to an unspooling relief. She had panicked for nothing. Carmen didn't know. She was just being her usual, spoiled self.
Laughing with sudden giddiness, Vera leaned back on her palms. Her secret was safe, for now. "Why me? Don't any of your famous friends wanna hang out?"
Carmen's smile faded. She looked down at her phone. "I don't know. I'm just so tired of it all right now."
"Tired of what?"
"Everything!" Carmen reclined in her seat and squinted up at the hazy azure sky, crossing one impossibly long bronze leg over the other at the ankle. "Marina and Troy posting photos from their disgustingly adorable date at the beach. Cora telling me I should ask Andre about a fake relationship because you go out for dinner once and everyone assumes you're a couple. People who only give a shit about me because they hope my fame will rub off on them. The cameras and the gossip and the fakeness. It's so fucking exhausting." One palm on the crown of her hat, she looked at Vera. "You're like my only friend who's normal. I don't feel like I have to be on with you. I appreciate that."
Something squeezed in Vera's chest. She hadn't realized that Carmen saw her as a friend. Even after everything they had been through together, it had never occurred to her to see Carmen as anything more than a client, a celebrity who always had been and always would be somewhere out of her reach. The squeeze felt a little bit like guilt.
"Even Sharise is up my ass all the time lately. I feel like I can't do anything without worrying how it will look for my brand," Carmen complained. "Oh my god, I was on that live for the charity last night, did you see it? I wanted to tell all those kids in the comments with their stupid Red Carpet memes to go fuck themselves, but everyone expects me to keep my mouth shut and take it like I'm some kind of role model or something. I have feelings too, okay? Ugh!" She tossed back her drink. "Come on, I need a refill."
Vera stumbled to her feet and hurried after her into the house. "Sharise is just looking out for you," she protested, because the rest of that rant was A Lot, and she was not prepared to manage Carmen's big feelings today.
"I know that, god. She thinks I'm gonna fuck up the chance I'm getting with this Merry Sanders film. Everyone thinks that. No one thinks I can actually do anything worthwhile."
"That's not true. I mean, I know Sharise doesn't think that. Maybe other people do."
"I'm not an idiot. Everyone just thinks I am." She slammed her glass onto the cement counter so hard Vera was surprised it didn't break. "Meanwhile Marina could kick a fucking puppy and people would still be begging to lick her asshole." She dumped ice into the glass, then sloshed some very expensive vodka over top. "What are you drinking?"
Carmen seemed so determined to overshare that Vera probably did need a drink. "White wine?"
There was a bottle of white in the wine fridge under the island. Vera thought the label might have been made of real gold leaf. The huge kitchen felt so empty with only the two of them. So lavishly lonely.
"You know we got famous at the same time?" Carmen said, shoving the glass of wine into Vera's chest before she swept away, still talking. "We both broke out in Our Family Tragedy and had to do the whole child-star circus. We both had psycho momagers who manipulated us and messed us up. But because I don't take shit anymore, and I fired my mom and got a real manager, and I actually have opinions, I'm stuck doing shitty rom-coms with people like Troy fucking Dicks so I don't drown in debt. And then they beg Marina to star in everything they write. The only reason I got the stupid Sanders part was because Marina dropped out to make bank on that superhero movie instead. If you tell anyone I said that I will shoot you. I hate this industry." She threw herself back onto the lounger and let out a long, tired sigh as she put her sunglasses back on. She was either drunk or legitimately fed up with her manufactured life, because instead of denying that they'd ever been close, like she'd done before, she said, "I hate how you can think someone is your friend and then they just stab you in the fucking back."
Vera paced over to the edge of the pool, twisting her wine glass in her hands. Staring down into the shimmering depths, she bit her lip. This was her opening. She should tell Carmen right now, while they were talking about Marina, while Carmen was in a sharing, and maybe understanding, mood. She wasn't sure she could go through the terror of thinking she was caught out again. She opened her mouth.
"She's bi, like you," Carmen said, but then she didn't say anything else.
Vera turned around to see Carmen staring down into her fluted glass, a deep frown on her lips. She needed to own up to having met Marina, but the moment had passed. She couldn't do it when Carmen already looked so hurt. But maybe... The problem, really, was Carmen and Marina's falling out. If they made up, then Vera working for both of them would be a non-issue. Carefully, she asked, "How do you know that?"
"Everyone knows." Carmen waved her hand, hot-pink manicure catching the sun. "Isn't it weird to date girls? Like, don't you miss dick?"
That surprised a snort out of Vera. Normally questions like that annoyed her, but Carmen sounded so sincere in her curiosity she couldn't be offended. "No. I mean, strap-ons exist, if that's what you're into. Honestly, I like sex with women better."
Carmen pursed her lips. "Does Sharise own a strap-on?"
Vera's face went very hot. "Shut up, you didn't just ask me that."
Carmen let out a cackling giggle with an edge of hysteria. "I seriously can't believe you two are fucking. Sharise is so picky. You must've really done something right. You know--" She lowered her sunglasses to be sure Vera saw her huge brown eyes, narrowed until they cut like knives. "Sharise is basically my sister. If you pull an Ellie on her I will fuck you up. I made you, and I can end you."
"I would never hurt her," Vera said, and she meant every word of it.
Carmen stared for a moment longer before she slipped her sunglasses back onto her nose. "It's so hot today." Abruptly all bubbles again, she set down her glass and jumped to her feet. "Let's go swimming. You didn't bring a suit, did you? I'll lend you one."
Vera gulped half her glass of wine and hoped she never had to see that look on Carmen's face ever again. She needed to talk to Jay. And Sharise. They had some friends-or-maybe-more to reconcile.