‘This is tough, isn’t it?’
She nods, feeling drained.
‘Yeah, believe me, I’ve been there. In your shoes. I was probably the same age as you when my album went to number one in fifty countries. Crazy.’ He shakes his head. ‘I didn’t know what was going on. I didn’t know—’
Curtis enters the room, and Jack sits up straighter. Curtis places a coffee down on the desk before Jack, then goes to his usual position at the side, like a shadow.
‘Thanks, man.’ Jack takes a sip and gets into business mode, giving her feedback as he has done for all the contestants seeking reassurance. Before and after the show, they gather around Jack at every opportunity eager for his attention and praise, and over the past two days out of sheer exhaustion Laura has stood back and watched, feeling as if they’re all birds loitering at an outdoor restaurant feeding on scraps of food and leftovers. They watch and wait, ready to be thrown anything by Jack their way; a compliment, a word of advice, a tip or a thinly veiled warning or critique. They catch it and they peck, peck, peck, analysing it, clinging to it, wanting to be filled by him, but they never are. They can never be fed enough praise, analysis, or dissection of themselves and their talent from the master.
‘Look, Lyrebird, don’t worry about tonight, it’s part of the show. Everyone has their ups and downs. It’s good for you to have a journey, to show that you, like them, have a struggle. But the audience chose to save you. Look at poor Rose and Tony, their act was a disaster. She fell on her face, dressed as a hotdog.’ He starts laughing, a smoker’s chesty laugh. ‘Did you see the ketchup …?’ He stops laughing when she doesn’t join in.
‘Tonight’s performance was written for me by your show while I was in Australia,’ Laura says to him, confused. ‘I was told to learn it on the flight. I had one day to learn the dance.’
He sighs. ‘Rehearsal time was short, I understand, but believe me, the Australian trip was the chance of a lifetime. We debated it, but felt it was the best thing to do, and we needed you on the first semi-final show on the back of the Cory Cooke Show and before public interest waned. That trip was the trip of a lifetime, and any of the others would have chosen going there over a longer rehearsal.’
‘The others won’t even look at me.’
‘They’re jealous. Lyrebird, you’re going to win this show and everyone knows it.’
Her mouth drops open. ‘Jack, you said I was awkward. You said it was awful. You said I can’t dance. You were embarrassed for me – cringing, in fact …’
‘That was true,’ he laughs. ‘It was fucking awful.’ He laughs alone. ‘Oh, come on. Lighten up.’
‘I didn’t want to do that routine. I told you I wasn’t a dancer. I told you it wasn’t me. We sat right here, I told you I didn’t like the script. You told me to do it.’
‘Lyrebird.’
‘My name is Laura!’ She bangs her hand down on the table.
‘Don’t forget yourself, young lady,’ Curtis warns. ‘Don’t get too big for your boots.’
‘It’s okay,’ Jack says tiredly. ‘It’s just a show, that’s what we do. I was the big bad judge who talked bad about the nation’s sweetheart. You heard how the audience reacted, tomorrow they’ll all be talking about it and they’ll love you even more. Trust me, that’s the way it goes. Do you know how many votes our winner received last year? Sixty-five thousand. Do you know how many votes you received tonight to get through to the final?’
She shakes her head and hates herself for wanting to know.
‘Three hundred and thirty thousand.’
She looks at them both in surprise, but not for the reason they expect. She’s honoured, flattered, flabbergasted by the figures, but there’s something else that stuns her.
‘This is all a game to you,’ she says, her voice soft.
Perhaps it’s the softness that gets Jack the most. It gives him nothing to feel righteous or indignant over. She’s not angry, she barely had time to register the fact before she said it. Her bubble burst. He saw it happen. He just looks at her, frozen.
‘Okay, let’s wrap this up,’ Curtis says, standing up from propping against a table, as usual on the edges of the room. ‘You can leave now,’ he dismisses her, turning his back on her.