Filthy Dirty Laundry (Filthy Dirty Laundry #1) Read online

  Filthy

  Dirty

  Laundry

  Book 1

  kailin gow

  Filthy Dirty Laundry #1

  Published by Sparklesoup Inc.

  Sparklesoup.com

  Copyright © 2015 Kailin Gow

  All Rights Reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping or by any information storage or retrieval system, without the permission in writing from the publisher except in case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  For information, please contact:

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  First Edition.

  Printed in the United States of America.

  Chapter 1

  Sidney

  Tap. Tap. Tap.

  Somebody's Manolo Blahniks on the office waiting room floor. Another girl's Jimmy Choo's. A pair of Louboutins, belonging to the longest, most tanned pair of legs I'd ever seen.

  Tap. Tap. Tap.

  My own flats, battered and worn. I'm trying not to be nervous, but as I look at the women who surround me, I find myself biting my lip, looking down, trying not to blush.

  They're no better than you are, Sidney, I tell myself. You're good at this job. You deserve this job. You're going to get this job. I'm almost convincing.

  Almost, but not quite.

  Tap. Tap. Tap.

  I look around me at the other women interviewing. The perfect California blondes. Every inch a magazine editor. Perfectly highlighted blonde hair – equal parts warm amber and beach-bleached wavy goodness. Perfectly tailored jewel print dresses, cut to flatter trim figures that betray sufficient leisure hours spent on a yoga mat or under the aegis of a buff Pilates instructor. And expensive shoes.

  People who wear these must take cabs everywhere, I think.

  Real journalists sometimes have to run.

  I tell myself that I'm a real journalist. That I get the stories other people don't – because I'm willing to chase them. In flats, if necessary.

  But then I hear my mother's voice in my head. Dress for the job you want, Sidney. Looks are the only way a woman gets anywhere in this world.

  And my mother would know. Once upon a time, she was a Playboy centerfold: every teenage boy of a certain age's fantasy. The works: mod eyelashes, nice and thick, overdone blush, perfectly straight blonde hair, a voluptuously starved figure. She used her body to get ahead in more ways than one. She didn't have a lot of skills, my mother – still doesn't, unless you count perfectly targeted criticism as an art. But she had a lot of sex appeal, and she knew exactly how to use it to get what she wanted.

  And what she wanted was my father. You've probably seen him before, at least if you're prone to flipping through late 1980's TV dramas late at night on rerun channels. Or maybe you've seen him in those Maxwell House commercials and wondered, Hey, who's that guy? Haven't I seen him in something? To which the answer is yes, yes you have. He's Sam Stone, aka Dr. Ralph Anders, the bad boy physician with a drinking problem that made Monroe, MD, such a big hit. The show was supposed to be a breakout role for David Boyle, who played Max Monroe – a charming, do-gooder doctor with golden hair and a heart to match. Instead, my dad, who played the villainous womanizer Dr. Anders, became a fan favorite.

  At least for a while. The show was cancelled after one season, due to David Boyle having a jealous mental breakdown. If you read tabloids between 1988 and 1991, you've probably already familiarized yourself with my childhood. Sam Stone meets gorgeous playboy model Marla Hayworth. Sam Stone: spotted partying with Marla Hayworth with a few lines of Coke in Studio 54. A Vegas wedding, naturally. My mom and dad didn't have wedding photos, just paparazzi shots, and until I was seven it was a paparazzi sFILTHY DIRTY LAUNDRYof the two of them, drunk and stoned out of their mind, stumbling over an Elvis impersonator, my mom in a Victoria's secret white negligee instead of a wedding dress, that hung on our living room wall.

  But art imitates life and life imitates art and all that jazz. And by the early 90's, my dad was making headlines for other reasons. SPOTTED: SAM STONE WITH A YOUNGER MODEL. SPOTTED: SAM STONE, VOMITING UP HIS GUTS OUTSIDE A LOWER EAST SIDE NIGHTCLUB. SPOTTED: SAM STONE, PASSED OUT IN AN ALLEYWAY WITH AN EIGHTEEN-YEAR-OLD HOOKER.

  Not that my mother was hurt. Or if she was, she never showed it. She took it like a fighter.

  “Remember, honey,” she said to me, when I was seven years old. “Men can only do to you what you let them. Women were given less power than men in this world – and do you know what that means? If you want something badly enough, you have to go out and get it. Nobody can protect you for too long. Don't let love blind you to the truth about somebody.”

  She walked out on him a few days later.

  TV drama money doesn't go as far as you'd think. One season, no syndication profits. Up in smoke – or in bottles of vodka. And my mother didn't have a dime when she left. Neither did my father. Whatever he'd saved from Monroe, MD was long gone on the hookers with whom he spent his nights. And so my mother started from scratch. Her body was older – not the nubile fantasy of horny businessmen – but she found a living as an arm-candy-type for wealthy businessmen who liked to pinch her ass and make eyes at the cocktail waitresses serving them.

  She almost found love, once. She dated a guy I thought she'd settle down with, for a while – all through my teens. A doctor called Alan LeFleur – a divorcé with a nice big mansion near Rodeo Drive. From my freshman year of high school until right after I headed off to USC. It wasn't until right before my graduation that I found out why.

  “He has a house in Beverly Hills,” my mom said. “I registered you there. How else do you think I got you into the swankiest public school in the country?”

  And swanky it was. I was the poorest kid there, by a long shot. Being the child of a 1988 Playboy Centerfold and the disgraced star of a one-season wonder doesn't get you anywhere in a classroom full of the children of top agents, top producers, big-name movie stars, real A-Listers. But it was a good education, and I kept my head down and graduated top of my class – though I had my enemies. Alan LeFleur's daughter from his first marriage, a girl called Kendall, was in my year, and she made it her personal mission to ensure that everyone at school knew I didn't belong there. That I was a charity case, the result of her dad screwing “some hooker” and feeling “sorry for her poor kid, who probably doesn't even know who her dad is.”

  As I look at the impeccably dressed women waiting to interview all around me, I'm reminded of Kendall. It's been a long time since she last made me miserable – with the maturity and experience borne of being a recent college graduate, I tell myself it's not her fault. She had issues. She blamed my mom for her parents' divorce. But somehow, all these gorgeous, well-coiffed women with their perfect shoes and perfect hair and perfect clothes are bringing up my high school insecurities, which not even a perfect 4.0 GPA at USC and two years of field reporting at FILTHY DIRTY LAUNDRY can eradicate.

  Who are you, thinking you deserve this job? My subconscious is working overtime today. FILTHY DIRTY LAUNDRY will never hire you as a celebrity editor. You're a field reporter. You get coffee and string together puff pieces. That's all you're good for.

  I close my eyes, exhaling, trying to expel my insecurities. Breathe in, breathe out.

  Not that celebrity journalism's my dream, either. In the long run, I want to be a features reporter, focusing on in-depth cultural topics: investigating the belly of the beast, speaking trut
h to power, all that. But there's no better way to learn how to deal with powerful people than celebrity reporting. Pooh pooh it all you want, but you learn quickly some of the most important skills in the business: how to flatter people whose heads are so far up their own asses they can't see daylight, how to make people feel comfortable enough with you to divulge personal information you can splash across the front page, how to dig through dumpsters, pay off bellboys, get your hands filthy in order to get the dirt you need about Cameron Diaz or Jessica Chastain. Besides, here in California, the whole world seems to revolve around Hollywood. And while FILTHY DIRTY LAUNDRY might not be going to Syria and interviewing refugees, it's the job I'm best qualified for right now. I've been doing beat reporting for FILTHY DIRTY LAUNDRY since my sophomore year of college. And now it's my chance to use that experience to get in the door: to land a full-time gig. With health insurance. Can't forget about that.

  I take another deep breath. It's only Tegan, I tell myself. My editor at FDL. She's leaving – that shiny rock on her finger means she'll never have to commission a story about Jennifer Lawrence's trash again if she doesn't want to. She's always been nice enough to me – if slightly confused about why I didn't go out and spend hundreds of dollars on cocktails every night with the rest of the team. Celebrity journalism attracts a certain type, after all. Girls from expensive sororities with designer suits and neat hairstyles. Lots of fake tans, but the expensive kind. Lots of fake boobs, equally pricey. Girls who are doing this as a glamour gig because Daddy wants them to get some kind of a job, but who don't actually need to make rent. Tegan Snow probably doesn't even pay rent – no doubt she's the kind of girl whose daddy bought her an apartment the second she graduated from college.

  I can't fault her, though. She's a good editor, and she's always been nice to me. And she's a crack editor, for all her privilege. She manages to turn the normal celebrity puff pieces into something resembling a look into the hearts and minds of real life human beings. She cares about her job: even though she doesn't have to work at all. And right now, she's the one making the decision about who's going to replace her on the celebrity beat.

  I look at my CV again, hoping a last-minute go-over doesn't reveal any typos I've missed. Sidney Stone...skills...attention to detail....

  Come on, Sidney, I tell myself. You can do it.

  I've stared down more managers and PR reps than I can count. I've Shanghai'ed Emma Watson at the grocery store to get her opinion on which member of One Direction would make the best kisser (for the record, she was polite despite the fact I was being desperately rude, gave me a quote about how she was sure they were “equally good”, and only raised a slight eyebrow at the fact that I was essentially stalking her for two hours to make $100 on an online sidebar. Maybe she felt sorry for me. I'd feel sorry for me. Go figure).

  So why am I so nervous about Tegan asking me a few questions/

  Cindy, Tegan's assistant, comes into the waiting room.

  “Stone, Sidney?” she smiles down at me.

  Her shoes cost more than my whole outfit.

  “I'm ready,” I say.

  Chapter 2

  Tegan Snow is sitting across from me at her glass-top desk. It's a distracting office: the kind designed to make you lose your focus as you're talking. It's all glass. The top of the desk, the walls, the ceilings, everything. You can see all the LA skyline, the bluest sky, beach, and the lifestyles of the rich and famous. It's hard to keep staring at Tegan: at her perfectly foundation, carefully made-up face, with that view behind her.

  Maybe it's a test. I think. If you let your jaw drop, she knows you're terrible at focusing when it matters. For all I know, it could be true. I've been in this office a hundred times, and every time I find it hard to keep staring at Tegan, to pay attention to what she's saying. But today is harder than most times. I'm practically shaking – my heart is beating so damn fast I feel sure she can hear it. I want this job. I need this job. I'm hungry – no, starving – for this job. I can taste how much I want this job. Sure, the money may not look like much, but it's more than I've ever made any year ever, despite working all through college, and the benefits are incredible. Health, dental. I haven't gotten my teeth professionally cleaned in years, which I'm sure by LA standards makes me some kind of horrific unhygienic troll. A pension plan. Actual, grown-up people money. Just enough to pay the rent on my one-bedroom-flex apartment (For $100 less per month than my roommate I get the living room, which my roommate Kiley – a brash Australian brunette who's overstayed her tourist visa in the hopes of making it big as an actress – has to tramp through at 3 a.m. on her way home from her cash-under-the-table side job as a barmaid) in a sketchy neighborhood (not that I'm worried. Kiley grew up in the Outback wrestling alligators. One look at her buff figure and masculine stance and most potential muggers go running).

  “Well, well, well,” Tegan says. She's smiling somewhat sheepishly. I guess it's weird for her to interview me like this, when she's known me for so long. “Let's get started, shall we?” She takes a deep breath. I take a deep breath. Okay, we're doing this.

  “Why do you think you're the best candidate to be the new editor of the Celebrity section of FILTHY DIRTY LAUNDRY magazine?”

  Standard question. One I've prepared for. So why is my mouth so dry?

  “Uh...sorry?”

  Jeez, Sidney, what's wrong with you?

  She smiles like she hasn't heard me make an idiot of myself. “What makes you think you're the best person for the job to fill my shoes when I leave?”

  Oh. Right. Yeah.

  My adrenaline goes into overdrive. Come on, Sidney, I tell myself. You can do this. This job matters. Don't screw this up.

  Suddenly, my canned answers all sound stupid. I am a very responsible individual who is passionate about celebrity culture, with a strong work ethic and great attention to detail...who really loves Jennifer Lawrence. OMG I just wish she could be my BFF. Answers that are just the same as everyone else will give. Answers that will make me sound like a celebrity-worshipping robot.

  Answers that all the other girls, who don't need the money, who just want a glamorous gig between meeting The One at a bar and getting that all-important ring on their finger, will give, before giggling and sashaying their way into the corner office.

  I don't know what happens. My mind goes blank. And then I just start talking, and what I say is nothing like I planned.

  “Because I've had to work for it,” I say.

  Tegan looks up in surprise. “What? Sorry...”

  “I live in a one-bedroom apartment with a roommate in a sketchy neighborhood where I have to carry a knife on my way home from work. And I still stay out until 6 a.m. watching Jennifer Lawrence take her trash out if it means getting the story. I can't afford a cab – I definitely can't afford a Bentley – but I've walked three miles in the pouring rain just to stand outside a movie theater where Bradley Cooper might be seeing Frozen with his goddaughter.”

  Tegan looks confused, concerned.

  Stop talking, Sidney, I tell myself. You're embarrassing yourself. But somehow, I can't bring myself to stop. “You never knew, right?” I say. “I never had a story in late. Not once. I never didn't get the quote, the scoop. Even if I had to kill myself to do it. I never had a safety net. I made it work – any way I could. I cornered Emma Watson in a Dean and Deluca once.”

  She smiles faintly. “I remember. The One Direction poll.”

  “But the truth is, I know more about celebrity culture than anyone else,” I say. “I've seen it firsthand. The good and the bad. How celebrity can churn you up and spit you out. How one minute you're on top of the world. And then the next, you're in the garbage disposal getting torn up into a million pieces.” SPOTTED: SAM STONE, PUKING OUT HIS GUTS. The image of the tabloid comes into my head; I force it out.

  “I'm not intimidated by celebrities,” I say. “I'm not scared of them. I don't want Jennifer Lawrence to be my best friend. In fact, I'm 99% sure that her Everyone's BFF p
ersona is just as cooked up by her PR agent as Kirsten Stewart's bitch persona is by hers. Celebrity's...just a lie. Just a role. And I know how to get beyond it. I'm not impressed by fancy cars or fancy food or fine champagne. I'm not impressed by canned answers for puff pieces. I want to – I know how to – get inside people's heads, to figure out who they really are. And that's why I should be your Celebrity Editor. Because I'm about more than just figuring out a star's favorite color. I'm about exposing the whole truth of Hollywood: from the inside out.”

  Tegan is looking at me with a strange expression on her face. For a second I think she's going to kick me out of the office. But instead, a smile spreads across her face.

  “That's the most interesting answer I've had all day,” she says.

  I keep going. “I've been working for this magazine as a field reporter since I was just a freshman in college. Even after USC I've been freelancing for you, with no benefits, no health coverage, barely paying my rent, because I'm passionate about FILTHY DIRTY LAUNDRY and what you do. I know what makes it tick. I knew what people really want to know about the people they idolize. I know who to get the stories even TMZ is scared to touch.”

  Tegan nods.

  “I'm not going to lie to you, Sidney. There's stiff competition for this job. When I came into this job, I had a pretty fancy set of degrees and internships. And you'll be competing against candidates just like me: Masters degree from USC Annenberg. Internships at the New York Times and, hell, The New Yorker. Glossy fucking experience. And Pepper Park – or whoever the new publisher will be if they decide to sell – is going to push for an experienced, glossy hire.” She sighs. “But if it were up to me, Sidney...if it were entirely up to me.” She smiles a great beaming smile. “I know who I would recommend for the job. I don't have the power to make the final decision. But I have the power to say what I think. And I agree. I think celebrity journalism needs people like you: people who aren't just seduced by the glitz and glamour of a night at the Chateau Marmont. Who can see celebrities as people, not just icons. And who know how to get beyond the PR machine. Pepper might pick someone completely different. Someone more experienced. But me – I value honesty. And loyalty. And you've certainly shown FILTHY DIRTY LAUNDRY both things.”