The Singer

CHAPTER THREE - ON A TIGHT LEASH

SAM

"I'm listening," I say, urging Richard to continue.

"You and Iris are going to pretend to be in a relationship," Richard states matter-of-factly. My jaw falls and I lose all ability to speak. Sure, I respect the girl, but I would rather not be in a fake relationship with anyone. I don't think it would be possible for me to fake something like this. I've never even been in a real relationship.

"Excuse me for asking, but how the hell would anyone benefit from this?" I ask, neither of them acknowledging how absurd this is. Richard is the one who pushed the playboy persona on me in the first place, and now he wants me to fake date a woman who I've vomited on.

"You see, you and "your boys"," Richard says using air quotes, "are in quite a predicament with Stone Records, because you had a lapse in judgment. You haven't been allowed to post on social media, record new music, or perform anywhere in five months. George Stone doesn't even want you outside. Do you remember the first, and only, rule you had when they started representing you?" His words walk the line of anger and exasperation.

I start to answer and his hand flies up, signaling me to stop. "No public relationships. Good job for not breaking that one, but you managed to be the reason for every single rule that was pushed on you guys following that. The Stones have you boys on a very tight leash unable to do anything. If you break their biggest rule, you get dropped just like you guys have been hoping for."

"May I ask a question, Rich?" Carmen pipes up. Richard gestures for her to go on. "I wasn't aware this was the reason you were okay with this, why exactly is that rule in place, and will George Stone be able to negatively impact Iris's career?"

Richard scratches his chin, thinking for a moment, but I speak first. "Stone Records only promotes boy bands. Boy bands are generally marketed towards teenage girls. Teenage girls don't want their favorite members to have girlfriends. They also force any queer guys into the closet so that teenage girls still have the idea that their favorite boy could want them."

Carmen's eyes widen, "that's horrible. I can see why you would want out."

"Stone Records makes the more profit off of Four Of Wands than any other heartthrob under their label, so instead of dropping them from the label, allowing them to move forward, they are keeping them on tight reins so another label can't make money off of them," Richard explains. Carmen nods along in understanding and shoots me a sympathetic look.

"We can't remove ourselves because we signed a six-year contract, and it has only been four. We'd be blacklisted," I say, offering up more information to this woman I barely know. If Richard seems to trust her, I feel as though I can too. Julian, Dallas, Levi, and I barely ever discuss what is happening with our label because we all end up getting angry at each other, so I'm glad to be getting it out now.

I'm sick of the four of us turning on each other, when I got us into this mess in the first place.

"I see. So, will this negatively impact Iris?" She asks again, her focus returning to her client. The discussion of Stone Records made me nearly forget why I was here.

"I don't see why it would," Richard shrugs, "as long as it doesn't get back to George that this isn't a real relationship then she will be perfectly fine, and I will take the measures to ensure that."

My hands fly up without me even intending to do so. "I haven't even agreed to anything. How will this benefit Iris? Or you guys? Or Valerie?" I cannot begin to understand how Richard came to this plan in the first place. Why couldn't it be any of the other three? At least they've been in relationships, somewhat.