The Daughters Take the Stage

  “Thanks, Miss Jones,” he said as the doors rumbled shut.

  “You know, Jimmy,” Holla said. “You’re welcome to join me in any of my exercise classes. I’ll have Raquel give you a schedule.”

  “Thank you, Miss Jones,” said Little Jimmy, and Hudson could hear the embarrassment in his voice.

  Since she was twelve, Hudson had been expected to attend at least two fitness classes a week, which could be anything from yoga to power hula-hooping. Now poor Little Jimmy was going to get roped in, along with the rest of the staff. She just hoped that he wouldn’t be caught eating meat or cheese in front of Holla; that would be enough to get him fired. Holla had been obsessed with being “healthy” for years. Diabetes and heart disease ran in the Jones family, so Holla had cut meat, wheat, white flour, and sugar from her diet. This left fish, vegetables, fruit, whole grains, and all kinds of tofu. Naturally, everyone around Holla—including Hudson—was expected to eat this way, too. Even though Hudson could technically eat whatever she wanted when she wasn’t at home, she found that she stuck mostly to food that was Holla-approved. Eating anything sweet—even Pinkberry—actually felt a little dangerous.

  The elevator opened and they stepped into Holla’s spacious all-white chef’s kitchen. It was lined with gleaming chrome appliances and glass cabinets, and it had two of everything—two dishwashers, two refrigerators, and two six-burner stoves. Holla’s kitchen could feed at least a hundred people, not that they’d ever tried it—Holla didn’t usually have parties. The kitchen also doubled as the headquarters for Holla’s live-in staff. When they walked in, Holla’s blond, rail-thin chef, Lorraine, was rolling out dairy-free pastry on the butcher-block table; Mariana, the curvy Brazilian housekeeper, breezed through with armfuls of fluffy white towels; and Raquel, the sweet-faced and frighteningly competent house manager, polished a stack of silver. There was more staff, of course—a publicist, several yoga and fitness instructors, a business manager, a dog walker—but Lorraine, Mariana, and Raquel were the skeleton crew. There was also Sophie, who’d somehow beaten them downtown from the Pierre and was now sitting in front of a large computer monitor in the corner, reading e-mails. Seeing Sophie, Hudson wondered if Ava had believed the food-poisoning excuse. She walked over to the marble island in the center of the room and grabbed a handful of cut-up raw vegetables. Maybe chewing would relieve some of her stress.

  “So?” Raquel asked, looking up from the silver ladle she was polishing. “How did it go?” Raquel had always worn her long, thick black hair in a braid, until the previous month, when Holla had decided she needed a change. She’d sent Raquel off to a boutique salon in SoHo, where they’d given her a layered bob. It still didn’t look quite right on her.

  “It didn’t go so great,” Hudson said.

  “She had stage fright,” Holla said bluntly, removing her leather coat and draping it over a chair.

  “Oh,” Raquel said, her face crumpling. “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s fine,” Hudson said, suddenly mortified. “It wasn’t so bad.”

  “Would you like a little tea?” Lorraine asked gently, putting the kettle on the burner.

  “That’s okay,” Hudson murmured.

  “I’ll have some,” Holla said, brushing a perfect curtain of hair over her shoulder. “And Sophie? What did you say to people?”

  “That it was food poisoning,” Sophie chirped, avoiding eye contact with Hudson. “From tuna.”

  “Good,” Holla replied.

  Hudson felt the staff’s eyes on her. It was Holla’s lie, but she felt like a liar, too.

  “And where are we with the tour?” Holla asked.

  “Wembley in London, Madison Square Garden, Slane Castle in Dublin, and Staples Center in Los Angeles all sold out,” Sophie read off the computer screen. “Tokyo goes on sale tomorrow. Sydney’s still a question mark.”

  “Hmmm,” Holla said. In May, Holla would release her tenth album. This summer would be her fifth world tour. “And where are we with Saturday Night Live?”

  “You’re booked. March seventh.”

  “Wonderful!” Holla clasped her hands and turned to face Hudson. “Wait—I just had a thought.”

  “What?” Hudson asked cautiously. She didn’t like the way her mom was looking at her.

  “What if you did Saturday Night Live with me?” Holla asked. “A mother-daughter duet.” She looked at Sophie and Raquel. “Don’t you guys think so? It would be fun!”

  “Are you… are you serious?” Hudson stammered.

  “Don’t worry, you’ll be a pro at this by then,” Holla said, accepting a mug of ginger tea from Lorraine. “Oh, Sophie, call them back, would you? Call them back and tell them that—”

  “Can I talk to you upstairs?” Hudson asked.

  “’Course, honey,” Holla said, taking a sip of tea. “You go on ahead. I’ll meet you in your room.”

  Hudson grabbed her coat and walked to the staircase, stomping with barely concealed rage. Forty-five minutes earlier she’d frozen onstage and fled in terror, and now her mom wanted her to repeat the whole thing on live television? Hadn’t she seen what had just happened? As usual, her mom was in complete denial of reality, just because she wanted something. She’d have to be honest with her about the real reason she’d run off the stage; she would have to tell her exactly how much pressure she’d put on her. And this probably meant having a terrible, earth-shattering fight.

  When she reached the third floor she heard the sound of tinkling metal and scuttling paws as Matilda, her brindle-colored French bulldog, ran to greet her.

  “Hi there!” Hudson said, scooping the dog into her arms. “How’s my little girl?”

  Matilda gave Hudson’s chin a good licking, and Hudson rubbed Matilda’s stubby head. “Mommy totally blew it,” Hudson said.

  Matilda gave an uncertain snort.

  “Nope, it’s true,” Hudson said, and then put her down. Sometimes she wished she could be Matilda and not have to worry about anything but finding a cozy place to lie down and sleep.

  Hudson walked into her room, which was technically a suite. The first room was where she did homework and practiced piano, and the second was her bedroom and closet. It was lucky that she had two rooms because every square inch of both was stuffed. Hudson loved to collect clothes, furniture, albums, Barbies—anything, really. Traveling with her mom on tour over the years, Hudson had been able to find items from all over the world. In the living room were a sheepskin rug from Denmark, a mirrored vanity table from an antiques store in Paris, and a battered leather armchair from a flea market in SoHo. In her bedroom stood a full-length mirror with claw feet; a shabby-chic, whitewashed dresser; and a vintage wrought-iron daybed from London, which was in turn covered with silk cushions from India. She could spend hours at a flea market, rifling through what other people thought was junk. And even though she loved all fashion, vintage designs were her favorite. She liked to think that she was stepping back in time whenever she slipped on clothes from another era.

  “Why would you want to have other people’s furniture?” Holla would ask, slightly aghast, whenever Hudson lugged home a cool footstool or area rug. Hudson would just shrug and smile. That was the entire point: Other people’s marks on her clothes and furniture always made them seem more real.

  As Hudson padded across the sheepskin rug, she tried not to look at her most important secondhand item, standing in the corner: a baby grand Steinway piano. It had been her Grandma Helene’s. It was the first piano Hudson had ever played, back when she was five. She’d climbed right up onto the bench and started picking out chords by herself as her grandmother watched, amazed. Grandma Helene could play anything by ear, and she’d tried to teach her two daughters, Holla and Jenny, from the time they were little. Neither of them had cared much for it. Hudson, though, was different. She’d gotten all of Grandma Helene’s talent, and then some. Grandma Helene became her first teacher, and Hudson was a fast learner. At seven, she learned Beethoven’s Moonlight Sonata. At eig
ht, she could play Chopin’s Minute Waltz. At nine, she began to write her own songs. Grandma Helene gave Hudson the piano shortly before she became too sick to play it anymore. When she passed away, Hudson had the piano brought to her home and put in her bedroom, where she covered the walls and floor with special sound-absorbing pads. She played every night before she went to sleep, imagining that her grandma was still listening.

  “Lizzie writes stories, I surf, and you play piano,” Carina would say, and it was true. If she didn’t play for a couple of days, Hudson would feel herself start to get anxious, and she would toss and turn in bed at night, thinking about scary things. But as soon as she sat down at her piano and played, all of that would go away. Writing music calmed her down and helped her cope.

  But now, as she walked into her bedroom, she ignored the beautiful Steinway. The piano was what had gotten her into this mess in the first place. She wouldn’t even look at it, let alone play it.

  Hudson unbuckled the straps of her heels and pulled off her dress, then changed into a pair of flannel pajamas. Even with her mom’s expensive renovations, the heating system in the old house could be a little funky.

  “Honey?” Holla called out from the other room. “I brought you some tea.” She walked into Hudson’s bedroom and placed the mug on a side table.

  “I didn’t really have food poisoning,” Hudson said.

  “I know,” Holla said, playing with the chains of her necklaces. “But you’ve had a rough night.” Holla leaned down and straightened some picture frames on Hudson’s bedside table.

  “And asking me to be on Saturday Night Live is gonna make me feel better?” Hudson asked, flopping down on the bed and grabbing one of her silk-covered pillows.

  Holla looked at her. “If you’re going to make this your career, honey, you have to learn to let things go.”

  “Right. Like when your whole class watches you blank out,” Hudson said. “Those were people I know. People I go to school with. It wasn’t some random audience. And they’re not gonna let it go.”

  “You can’t care what people think,” Holla said more forcefully. “That’s what being an artist means. Do you think I ever cared about what people thought?”

  “So the solution is for me to do live television,” Hudson said.

  “You just got afraid up there,” Holla declared. “By the time you do the show, that’ll be over with.”

  “What if it’s not?” Hudson asked.

  “Why do you always have to look on the dark side of everything?”

  “And why do you always have to freak me out about everything?” Hudson asked.

  “What? How did I freak you out?”

  “By picking me apart. By telling me I’m doing everything wrong, all the time.”

  “I was giving you advice,” Holla said flatly. “Can’t I do that?”

  “But ever since I started this album, it’s like I can’t do anything right. You want me to do things exactly like you.”

  Holla furrowed her brow, the way she did whenever Hudson said something she thought was ludicrous.

  “You changed everything on my album,” Hudson went on. “You changed every song.”

  “Because I wanted your album to sell,” Holla replied.

  “But those were my songs!”

  “So you don’t want to be a success?” Holla said, letting her voice get loud. “You don’t want to sell out stadiums and be on the radio and have little girls scream your name when you walk down the street?”

  Hudson squeezed the pillow. Here we go, she thought. The unanswerable questions. “I just don’t want to be told over and over that I’m doing something wrong.”

  “Is that what you think?” Holla folded her arms. “Honey, you are gonna have to get a thicker skin. That’s all this business is, you know. Being criticized. For everyone who loves you out there, there’s someone who thinks you’re awful. But that’s not what I was doing. I’m just trying to help you. Who believes in you more than I do? Who’s been your biggest champion your whole life? Who got you the best piano teacher in the city? Who put you in dance classes when you were five because you wanted them?”

  Hudson picked at a loose thread on her bedspread, waiting for her mom to finish.

  “I wish someone had believed in me enough to cheer me on,” Holla went on. “I had to beg my mother to give me dance lessons. I had to beg her to take me to talent contests in Chicago. I had to do everything myself. My mom didn’t care. That’s why your aunt Jenny still doesn’t know what she’s doing with her life. Running around the world, pretending she’s some kind of fashion designer—”

  “Jewelry designer,” Hudson corrected.

  “Jewelry designer, whatever.” Holla snorted. “She could have been dancing Swan Lake at Lincoln Center, and now she’s flailing around, going nowhere. God knows I tried, but there was only so much I could do, after all.” She shook her head, as if the memory of her younger sister was too much. “So listening to you complain about my interest in your career… It just sounds a little ungrateful. And tonight wasn’t my fault. You can’t pin that on me. I’m sorry you got scared, but that wasn’t my fault.”

  Hudson knew her mom was right. She was trying to blame Holla, when the real problem was that Hudson just didn’t have what it took. She’d thought she did. She’d thought she could be a musician. But she’d been wrong. How had she ever thought she’d be able to do this? When she could barely talk in class?

  “I don’t think I can do this,” she said. “I want to get out of it.”

  “You’re the one who wanted to do this,” Holla said. “You’re the one who told me you were ready.”

  “I know,” Hudson said quietly. “I’ve changed my mind.” Just saying it was such a relief.

  “Honey,” Holla said, moving closer to Hudson and taking her hand. “You’re just upset. Don’t say things you don’t mean.”

  “I do mean it,” Hudson said, looking her mom straight in the eye. “I’ve never meant anything more. I don’t want this,” Hudson said. “I’m not like you. We both know that.”

  Holla’s face grew serious. She stood up from the bed. “You’re making a big mistake. One that you will regret the rest of your life.”

  “I’m fourteen,” Hudson said. “I’ll have another chance.”

  “Not like this,” Holla said. “I’m not always going to be able to help you this way. You’re throwing away a huge opportunity here, an opportunity other girls would kill for.”

  But I’m not like other girls, Hudson wanted to say.

  “And what are we going to tell your label?” Holla asked, her voice rising again. “That you just want to scrap it all? After we made all those changes?”

  “Tell them I’m so sorry. Tell them I have stage fright. I don’t know. Tell them anything.”

  Holla tapped her foot on the wood floor. “It’s a good thing you’re my daughter. Otherwise they would sue you for breach of contract.”

  “I know I’m your daughter.” Hudson sighed. “Believe me.”

  Holla stared at her for a few more seconds. “I never thought that you’d be the type to give up.”

  For a second Hudson felt a twinge of sadness, mixed with fear—a feeling of regret before it had actually become regret. “Well, I guess that’s who I am,” she said, and lay down on her bed, facing the wall.

  For a moment there was silence, and then she heard Holla walk out of the room. Hudson listened as the door shut, her eyes still on the wall. It was over.

  Hudson lay there, unable and unwilling to move. Outside a car alarm wailed. She shut her eyes and wondered if she could just stay in this position for the rest of her life. So that’s it, she thought. The album. Her music. Her dream. Everything. It was all finished. She knew that she’d done the right thing, but it didn’t feel right. She felt even worse now than she had in the bathroom at the Pierre. But she hadn’t had a choice, really, when she thought about it. Tonight had shown her that.

  After a few minutes, Hudson got up and
walked into the next room. Matilda stared at her from her dog bed, tilting her blocky head as if to say, That didn’t go so well, huh?

  Hudson grabbed her laptop. In times of crisis, she always needed to do two things: text Carina and/or Lizzie, and check the next day’s horoscope. First she logged on to signsnscopes.com and checked Pisces for the next day, December 21.

  Congratulations! With Uranus, the planet of surprise, moving into your tenth house of career, expect a major work development that will have you smiling!

  Hudson closed her laptop. She hated it when she did something to contradict her horoscope. But maybe astrology was just a bunch of nonsense, anyway. According to her chart—the one Aunt Jenny had given her for her last birthday—she was supposed to be incredibly successful. Famous, even. “Almost as famous as your mom,” Jenny had whispered, with a wink.

  Hudson went back to her desk and got out the chart. It was covered in one of those sheets of plastic used for term papers. The chart was a large circle, sliced into wedges and covered in weird hieroglyphics and waves and cut through with straight lines radiating in all directions. She didn’t know enough to actually read charts yet, but she remembered the spot on the circle where her career was. It was a mess of squiggly lines and shapes.

  “Whatever,” she thought, and put it back in the drawer, shoving it in far enough that she wouldn’t be able to look at it again without doing some serious spring cleaning.

  Just then her phone, which was still in her purse, on the floor, chimed with a text. She reached down and pulled it out.

  It was from Lizzie.

  Why’d u leave me w/this??:)

  Just below the text was a photo of Carina and Alex with their arms around each other at the Ball, smiling and looking goofily into each other’s eyes.

  Hudson wrote back:

  Because I have food poisoning, remember??

  Hope you’ve been throwing up for hours Lizzie wrote.

  U know it.

  At least she still had her friends, she thought later, as she climbed into bed. And no matter what happened, that would never change.