From the Top - Chapter 24

The house was … quite the experience. While I was the youngest by a good couple of years, everyone was still fairly young, with the oldest contestant topping out at twenty-nine. It wasn’t hard to imagine what would happen when young and generally attractive people were all thrown in a mansion together. Especially, with the massive bar stocked with a mountain of alcohol.

On the plus side, the house was amazing. “House” was actually an understatement. “Mansion” was a much more apt description. Even at its size, we still had to double and triple up, since it didn’t have thirty bedrooms. But the rooms were so big that even with two other people bunking with me, I still had more space than I’d had in my entire room in the trailer. I was also lucky that Vince, the obnoxious Jersey guy, didn’t get put with me. It was me, Cole, and some guy named Norman, although I didn’t get much more than his first name.

After catering fed us dinner, the party started kicking into high gear. After living with my dad, I didn’t particularly want to be in a room with a bunch of drunk people, so I found a side room just off the main room where everyone was gathering. I would have preferred to be up in my room, getting some rest for whatever they threw at us the next day, but the producers made it very clear they’d prefer to have us all together.

So I did my best to block out the sounds and laughter and focus on the history reading I’d brought with me. Part of me considered that I should be socializing, even if I didn’t drink. It was a TV show, after all. But … I was tired and a little overwhelmed. Partying with drunks just didn’t sound good to me.

So I curled up in a fancy chair, which was so cushy that I nearly disappeared into it, and tried to make sense of the dense textbook chapter on the Antebellum South. But the noise of the lively party kept breaking my concentration. Someone turned on a radio, and pop hits were blasting. Laughter and shouted conversations carried over the thumping bass.

The longer I sat there, the louder it got, until a burst of raucous laughter made me lose my place. I looked up with a sigh to see a group of the contestants stumbling into the main room, red plastic cups in hand.

“Come on, let’s find some fun in this place!” one of them shouted, her words slightly slurred.

She had jet-black hair and smoky eye makeup, paired with a tiny black dress that left little to the imagination. I thought I remembered seeing her at the orientation thing, and she’d been dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, which meant she’d changed after we got here. The small herd cheered in response.

“Look at all these hotties just waiting for us!” the ringleader purred as she looked around the room.

I’d seen a lot of drunks in my life, and she wasn’t that drunk. She was hamming it up, very aware that a camera was on her. A few of the guys whooped and hollered, egging her on. I rolled my eyes. This was a singing competition, so what was the point of all this? I mean, wouldn’t they prefer to win and get the money and the contract, instead of going for that fifteen minutes of TV fame?

The woman began making her way around the room, getting handsy with any man in her path. I was happy to see there were some disgusted rejections, which meant not everyone was a complete loser, but there were also plenty of welcoming grabs in return. I grimaced and held my book up higher, willing myself to become invisible.

My luck remained constant … all bad.

“Ooh, what do we have here?” I heard her say from a lot closer than she had been before.

I lowered my book to see her sauntering toward me, a predatory glint in her eye.

“Hey there, cutie. What’s your name?”

“Nuh, uh. No thanks,” I said, just wanting her to go away. “I’m just going to sit here and read.”

“Don’t be like that!” she said, running a long nail down my arm.

“Whoa, take it easy,” I said, holding up my hands. “I appreciate the offer, but I have a girlfriend.”

“She’s not here though, is she? What happens in the mansion stays in the mansion.”

She went to slide onto my lap and I quickly stood up, dropping my book.

“Seriously, I’m not interested,” I said firmly. “Why don’t you go back to the party?”

“What are you, gay or something?” Vince called out, to laughter from a handful of the other less serious competitors.

“I’m seventeen, which means I’m jailbait, if I guessed your age right. So … unless you like prison …?”

That gave her pause. She looked me up and down, realization dawning on her face.

“Oh … uh,” she said, backing away. “Have fun with your book, kid.”

I wasn’t sure I loved being called ‘kid,’ but as long as she left me alone, I was fine with it. Picking up my book, I sat back down and tried to find my place. The party ramped up as more people joined the drinking. The music grew louder, and people paired off, giggling and stumbling around.

I noticed Cole was one of the drinkers, although he wasn’t acting as drunk, fake or not, or as idiotic as some of them. I wasn’t going to hold that against him. I may not drink, but I wasn’t going to kill the buzz if others wanted to.

I gave up trying to study, with all the noise going on, and opted to just watch them until it was okay to head upstairs when I noticed one of the producers who’d been around when we’d gotten to the house that afternoon. He was a portly guy in a polo shirt and cargo shorts, and he was walking straight toward me.

“Hey there, Charlie,” he said, kneeling down so he was on my level. “I’m Mike. I know not everyone wants to get involved with this kind of thing on the first night, but we’d love it if you got a little more involved with the group. These early days are important for making connections with the audience, who are going to watch clips of everyone interacting throughout the first several weeks the show is on.”

While all of that made sense, I did not want to actually hang out with a bunch of drunks or around a bunch of drinking. While I could handle it when it was my friends, being close to drunk strangers gave me one too many flashbacks.

“I’m good here, thanks.”

Mike chuckled. “Come on, I know you’re smarter than that. Like I said, this is more than just a singing competition; it’s a reality show. Sure, we want good singers, but we also want big personalities. The fact is, most people vote based on emotion, and the ‘character’ they like the most, so standing out in the footage is going to be a big part in deciding who wins the live rounds.”

“So what should I be doing?”

“Work the room a little, make friends, drink with your castmates. That kind of thing.”

“You know I’m not twenty-one, right?” I said, hoping that would be enough to stop the drinking suggestions.

“Soda then, it doesn’t really matter. You have a red cup in your hand, people will assume what they assume, and you’ll be covered from any liabilities. Just make yourself seem personable; build your fanbase for when the live shows start.”

“I appreciate the advice,” I said.

“All right,” he said, standing back up and holding his hands up. “I’m not going to force you to do anything you don’t want to, but think about this; half the people here can sing. What’s going to make you stand out? Give the audience a reason to connect with you, root for you. Otherwise, you’ll just fade into the background.”

He clapped me on the shoulder. “Just some food for thought. I’ll leave you be for now, but try to mingle a bit, yeah? It’s only the first night.”

With that, he turned and headed back toward the main party, calling out instructions to the camera guys. I settled back into the plush armchair, picking up my history book.

Here I thought I was joining a music competition.

***

I dragged myself out of bed the next morning despite every fiber of my being wanting nothing more than to pull the covers over my head and try to go back to sleep. I’d finally managed to escape to my bed at ten, but the party had gone on until almost two, and Norman didn’t return to the room until three, drunkenly stumbling around to find his bed. Only the sound of Cole pulling himself out of bed got me up. Norman was still snoring loudly, and he was probably going to sleep until a producer came and pulled him out of bed.

The smell of bacon and coffee hit me as soon as I stepped off the stairs and into the open-concept kitchen/living room area. Most of the other contestants were already up, clustered around the long dining table that filled a good chunk of the space. Plates piled high with pancakes, eggs, fruit, and other breakfast foods covered the table. My stomach rumbled, reminding me I hadn’t eaten much yesterday.

I grabbed a plate and loaded it up, finding a place to sit at one corner of the big dining table, on the opposite end from where Vince and Candi, the drunk girl from the night before, were sitting. Most of the people at the table looked hung-over and very rough. Cole made his way down a few minutes later and found a spot a few down from me.

“Morning,” I said.

He just groaned. I couldn’t help but notice he only had a dry pancake and coffee. I didn't think that he had got that drunk the night before, but he was clearly feeling the effects. I would have preferred to move over to the bar by the island in the center of the kitchen, but I remembered what the producer had said about needing to be social.

“Pass the syrup,” one of the guys said, startling me a bit since I’d kind of zoned out.

“Oh, sure,” I said, handing it across.

“So last night you said you were from Austin?” the guy who’d asked for the syrup said to the girl next to me.

“A little town outside of it,” she said.

“Austin’s got a great music scene. I played a show there once a couple of years ago during South by Southwest.”

“That’s a tough gig to get. A lot of big bands come in for that.”

“My buddy had a cousin who knew the owner. It wasn’t a great spot, but everything was crowded that whole week, so it still got us recognized. Name’s Larry,” he said, extending his hand to her.

“Marissa,” the Austin girl replied. “What about you? I’m guessing not Texas.”

It wasn’t a wild guess, considering his accent didn’t sound southern at all.

“No. Chicago originally, but I live in Memphis now,” Larry said.

“Memphis and not Nashville?”

“I tried Nashville, and the scene was a little crowded. It also skews very heavy to country, and so I didn’t find it worked out that well for me.”

“I played a festival in Nashville that included a lot of pop and rock,” I said.

“Festivals are different. They’re cool, but there aren’t enough of them to pay the rent,” Larry said.

I just shrugged. He wasn’t wrong, but I’d talked to people in several places in Nashville when Warren and I had been looking for gigs and knew there were a lot of places where he could play stuff other than country. But it was his life, and I wasn’t here to convince him he was wrong.

“What’s your name?” Marissa asked me.

“Charlie. I’m from a place just outside of Asheville, North Carolina.”

“That’s not far from Nashville. Country singer?”

“No. Well, a little, but more blues and classic rock. I kind of bounce all over.”

“Man, you gotta find a niche. It sounds cool when you say your genre is eclectic or whatever, but if you want to build an audience, you gotta find your niche,” Larry said.

“That’s not entirely true,” Cole pointed out. “Trisha Loren plays both rock and pop, and her albums kind of bounce back and forth between them, and she’s huge.”

“Yeah, but she got big in rock and didn’t start going more pop until after she got big. Once you’re famous, the rules kind of go out the window, as long as you can bring your audience with you,” Larry said, before turning back to me. “Did someone say last night that you’re, like … seventeen?”

“Yep.”

“Man, that’s young to be in a thing like this,” Marissa said. “You must have just gotten started.”

“I’ve been up on stage for a few years, but I started playing practically from when I was born. My dad was a musician, so we traveled with him all the time when I was younger. I spent most of my childhood in bars, clubs, and backstage.”

“That’s cool,” Larry said.

“Playing with your dad doesn’t make you a real musician,” Vince called out from down the table. “Real musicians pay their dues on the road before they make it big.”

A few of the others around the table nodded and murmured in agreement. I ignored him. Besides already showing himself to be an idiot, he had no idea about who I was or what I’d done.

“Now, hold on,” Larry said, jumping to my defense. “Just because he’s young and he learned from his dad doesn’t mean he hasn’t put in dues.”

“All I’m saying is, playing cover songs at county fairs doesn’t mean you have what it takes to play in front of a real audience,” Vince said.

“Nothing wrong with fairs. It’s where I got my start before I switched to busking. Made some decent money at it, too,” a girl with a nose ring said.

“Yeah, but busking isn’t the same as playing real shows, though,” a different guy said.

“Bullshit it’s not. Busking is hard as hell, and you have to work the crowd twice as hard to get paid. At a paid gig, you get paid regardless of whether the audience is into it or not,” someone else added.

I saw Cole look at me and open his mouth, and I was certain he was about to defend me. He knew about my record deal, and we’d talked about a few of the places I’d played before, including the New Year’s show and the stadium in Richmond, opening for House of Grace. While I wasn’t embarrassed about those things, I also didn’t really want them to know anything about me. If they were happy to underestimate me, I was happy to let them.

I caught his eye and shook my head subtly, waving him off from saying anything. He kind of crinkled his brow in confusion, but shrugged and went back to drinking his coffee.