works it. After all, her sensational style has been on the cover of Elle and Vanity Fair for months. They’re calling it “eclectic.” She has tucked her trademark peacock feather behind her left ear today, bouncing with her boundless energy.
“I told you she’d be here! Honestly, you never listen anymore! RoMo, I swear to God, if there’s one scratch on that rabbit I will cut off your penis and feed it to the sharks at the LA Zoo!”
Mystery solved.
She has always been one fiery phoenix of a girl, having risen from poverty to become one of the highest-paid entertainers on the market. She ends the call before her bright eyes—diamonds of blue that pin me like icy daggers—set on me. She slides her phone into her left bra strap and presses her hands on her hips.
“The Juice,” she says deploringly.
“Rue, actually. Rue Norfolk. I spoke with you on the phone—”
“You’re early.”
“Actually, you’re—”
“Let’s skip the small-talk.” She descends the steps on her fuck-me heels and stops a foot and a half away. Her rep says she’s five foot three and one hundred and thirteen pounds, but I’m two inches smaller and twenty pounds lighter, and she looks anorexic. Closer, her cheeks are gaunt and dark rings show under her eye makeup.
“Small talk skipped,” I confirm.
She cocks her head. “Wait… aren’t you the little shit who wanted to order Chip 'N Dales for me?”
“And take you out to dinner. That’s still an option.” I grin.
“I never said no to the Chip 'N Dales.”
Her manager interrupts then, shooting Holly a meaningful look. “But she’s much too busy with her schedule,” the man digresses.
Holly sighs, and tells Joe Maroski she doesn't need a babysitter. “I’ll be a princess, I promise,” she says, before leading me up the street to a little corner cafe. Joe tries to deter us—I have, after all, stepped on all but one of his toes in the past—but once Holly’s mind is set there is no changing it.
I wonder if it’s safe for her without a bodyguard. Rumor has it, she hasn’t kept the same one for more than a month; the poor man-beasts can never keep up with her. She’s like the Hope Diamond on legs. You get one look at her in the open and you’ll never remember another cheap-ass engagement ring again, but good luck catching her.
At the cafe, she orders a skinny soy latte, no whip, in a dejected sort of tone that tells me she’d rather have the triple mocha latte with extra whip, and could you be a doll and drizzle some of that caramel on it too?
I order a tea.
“It must be hard,” I begin, “to be in the public eye all the time.”
We sit at a window seat, a peculiar spot, since it’s just inviting the paparazzi to take a good shot of her. Perhaps that is her plan: playing nice with the paparazzi—after all, I'm one of them. “That’s one question you can’t ask," she replies, "so save your breath. Oh, and don’t ask about my family. Or Roman.”
“Why is he so secretive?”
“You can’t ask that.”
There goes half of my interview. The world believes that they are the Cory and Topanga of Hollywood. I size up her expression, her mood, but she has sealed it all away. Even testing the waters might land me on the permanent blacklist, and that would be bad for business. So, we skim the water to find something we can talk about.
Which is—that’s right—the weather.
“Got a hot date on this beautiful Friday evening?”
She’s not going for it. “I don’t see why you try to interview people like me. I’m not going to tell you what you want to know. I won’t tell you where I live or what type of car I drive. You want to know my astrology sign? Aries. My SAT scores were 1460. Someday, I want to play a gig at Madison Square Garden.”
“Which, congratulations, by the way. Summer of next year, right? End of July?”
“I’m stoked.” A smile blossoms onto her face like a moonflower. “It’s been my dream since, well, ever.”
“So dreams really can come true.”
“Sometimes…” She shrugs. “Dreams change, too. What you thought you wanted at sixteen isn’t what you want at twenty.”
“Did you ever dream you’d be on the cover of Vanity Fair?”
“Used to!” She forces a laugh. “Now, all I dream about is a good night’s sleep.”
I nod sympathetically. “This sort of popularity must be tough. You’re the spokeswoman for Covergirl now, right? And a lot of charities.”
“Yeah,”