The Tour. | +18 | BWWM

𝄞 33 | The Bar

I stacked everything into Zoey's suitcase. Wrapping her costumes up into the dress bags took more time than I thought it would but I got it done. Then I threw one more suitcase on the bed. I didn't bring much to stay at the Citizen Hotel. It was an elegant hotel any other time the skyline views of Sacramento would be stunning. The hotel had so much going for it that it would have me stay for a short trip in the city. But the reality TV cameras made this place never feel safe to me. With Zoey staying here almost all the time using the studio. Plus, she's always hanging out with the other teams. It was a little straining. I barely used the studio but that niggling feeling in the back of my neck would never go away. It kind of pisses me off how right I was and how it bites Zoey in the ass.

A quick knock on the door draws my attention and I open it to the hotel concierge. I move out of the guy's way to get the bags.

"Ya, just put the bags in the back of the car. I left it unlocked, it just closed and it will lock on its own." He nods at me and I tip. "Thank you, Marcus." The man looked up at me with surprise in his expression. Then I checked the shadowed, empty spot where his name badge should have been. He was one of the many people I've only seen just a few times at the hotel. Since many of the employees work around the time when the cameras were not running for the show. When they worked they had no name badges on also for the show. It's almost like Paulie wanted them to be a little more than furniture. I always thought it was very disturbing, so I took a point to learn as many names as I could. It felt more humanizing. Paulie had a habit of de-humanizing anything he could get his hands on. Marcus smiled at me and started moving Zoey's suitcases out the front door.

The duffle bag with my few things was so light. Really, a reminder again of how little time I spent and how little trust I had. For a place, I barely spent time at I was surprised at how much nostalgia I had for it. The hotel room where I first saw Asher up close was down the hall from us. With the elevator ding another memory of simply being in the elevator with Asher and being teased by him. The first time he called me Birdy. Not everything from the hotel was bad, some good mixed with it. Any other reason to be at this hotel would have been an amazing trip.

I spotted those red nails, my hackles went up. Her long nails were the kind of blood-red that could be spotted across the room. I knew her from my YouTube side hustle. When she does her segments on YouTube sometimes, she taps her nails on the desk to make a point. I wasn't a fan of Drama's Kiss but YouTube is a lot like high school. In a way, for the USA and EU creators, almost everyone knew each other. The degree of separation were so thin, it adds to the gossip. I never got the point of gossiping about someone on YouTube. The community of creators is shockingly small. A few people make tons of videos and money. The backbone of YouTube and yes it's a lot of views altogether. But the number of people who have Hollywood levels of fame is very few. Most of YouTube still doesn't go live like the twitch creators. Yes, there are some standouts with millions of active subscribers. But that doesn't apply to most creators. So the reporter of Drama's Kiss gossiping about people the way she does is weird. It's like TMZ Sweet Valley High addiction with a touch of ghoulish to it.

Trisa from Drama's Kiss and in my head I said the name along with her tagline. Your business is my Drama's Kiss. Ew, ghoulish. Trisa licks her lips at the barman putting a drink in front of her. He was a good, casually good-looking guy. Not too young, not too old in that zone where you can't make an easy guess at age. He was dark skin tall and barely making eye contact with her. She swirls the cosmopolitan in the martini glass. Then she took a sip and put the glass down. Her red fingernail tapped against the bar top. The sound was loud in the empty bar without a single cast member from the show or anyone from the backstage crew. A lot of things slid into place in this bar with nobody in it. In a hotel rented out for the show. And a video of my best friend kissing a woman in shadow. Now the woman who leaked it made it into a story. She took something perfectly normal, into something that was shocking. My anger was rising. I felt like the Hulk and was ready to Hulk out. Hulk wanna smash.