Thorne Princess(3)
“You know…” I flipped my dyed burgundy tresses as we made our way to the bar, bypassing masked up bellboys, concierges, and ma?tre d’s. “The Chateau Marmont is known for being populated by people either on their way up or on their way down. Which category do you think we fall into?”
“Neither.” Keller led me to the oaky, red bar of the hotel, with the familiar maroon stools and matching overhead chandeliers. “We’re just beautiful spawns-of. Born into high society and low expectations. We’re going nowhere.”
Keller was the son of Asa Nelson, front man of the band She Wolf and the biggest rock n’ roll legend still alive. Both our last names opened doors—not all good.
We settled at the bar. Wordlessly, the bartender Frederik, slid a Marmont Mule cocktail my way, fixing Keller his regular, Bleu Velvet. Frederik wore an all-white rabbit mask that highlighted his piercing blue eyes.
“I should take him home,” Keller muttered, elbowing me.
“He seems like a bad idea.”
“My favorite type,” my best friend retorted. “Yours, too.”
I didn’t acknowledge that last part. It wasn’t Keller’s fault he thought I slept with everything with a pulse—a common general vibe I gave people. But it never felt good to be reminded that I was lying to my best friend.
Before we even made it to our first sip, we were surrounded by two wannabe actresses, one reality TV star, and a life coach I was certain also moonlit as a waitress at The Ivy. Everyone stood around, preening, while trying to convince the people they mingled with that their big break was just around the corner. This was how Keller and I spent our nights. Every single one of them. Partying, drinking, mingling, pretending like the world was a big, fat pi?ata, ready to burst and rain fat fashion contracts, Vogue covers, and Oscars over our heads.
We were socialites. Young, rich, and bored.
We answered to no one and were sought after by everyone.
Technically, Keller and I both had jobs.
At twenty-seven, Keller was the owner of Main Squeeze, an upscale juicery in West Hollywood known for its detox bundle, favored by Victoria’s Secret models and Real Housewives.
I was an Instagram persona, meaning I got paid in luxury products and compliments, advertising products to my eight hundred thousand followers. Anything from clothes and handbags to tampons. My so-called “work” took two hours a week, but I was oddly protective of it. Maybe because I knew it was the only piece of me no one was allowed to invade or shape. It was all mine. My doing, my responsibility, my little, small win in this world.
“Isn’t it funny,” I mused aloud, swirling the swizzle stick in my drink. “How we can pretend like we’re productive members of society and the tabloids just run with it?”
The two actresses, reality star, and the life coach evaporated from our place at the bar the minute they spotted a Netflix star who’d entered the room wearing a medieval plague doctor mask.
That was the catch about L.A. It was a great place to accumulate people, as long as it wasn’t true friendship you were after.
Keller shot me a frown. “Speak for yourself. I do have a job. I own a juicery. I source all the ingredients myself.”
“Oh, Keller.” I patted his hand on the bar and held up my drink. “I’m ‘sourcing local ingredients’ right now. Don’t get me wrong, it’s an amazing hobby, but neither of us needs the money.”
We never spoke of it, but I’d always assumed Keller, too, got a hefty sum of allowance each month from his dad.
“No, Hal, you don’t understand. I have a job.” He frowned, rearing his head back. “With people on my payroll, quarterly meetings with my CPA, budgets, the entire shebang. If I don’t do things, they don’t get done.”
He was deep in denial. We were both counting on our parents to pay our rent, car leases, and life expenses. At least I had the dignity to admit it.
I took a sip of my drink, struggling to breathe in the tight dress. “I mean, sure. What I meant was, we have really fun jobs, so they don’t feel like jobs.”
Keller rolled his eyes. “That’s not what you meant.”
He was right. It wasn’t. But I was too exhausted from my deep-cleanse facial earlier to pick a fight.
“I just noticed Perry Cowen’s here.” Keller tilted his head behind my shoulder. “Her new balayage is fierce.”
I didn’t turn around to look. “Not sure a good balayage is going to fix the ugly that’s her soul.”
“Aww. When God made you pretty, he forgot the R.” Keller hopped off his stool. “I’m gonna go say hi.”
“But she is so basic, Kel.” I scrunched my nose.
“Behave while I’m gone.” Keller’s eyes flicked toward his own reflection dancing along a stainless-steel wine bowl before he headed toward his target.
Perry Cowen was an up-and-coming fashion designer and a woman I didn’t like. Mainly because she was designing my sister Hera’s rehearsal dinner dress. And anyone who was a friend of my sister’s was an enemy to me.
Perry had also sold a story about me to The Mail, after an unfortunate incident involving me, a bridesmaid dress, and an unexpectedly spicy pizza sauce. I knew it was her, because no one else in the room would leak it. My mother was horrified we were even related, Dad wasn’t an ass, and Hera…well, she hated how I always made headlines for the wrong reasons.