Angels on Sunset Boulevard Read Online Free Page A

roof of her mouth when she took a bite. “Wow. This is good. Where’s it from?”
    â€œBrooklyn.”
    â€œJoe Peep’s in the Valley?”
    â€œNo.
Brooklyn.
As in, next to Queens?” the guy replied. “Nothing but the best for Mr. Silver.”
    Taj almost choked on the slice. Flown in from Old Fulton Street? No way. It was a joke she and Johnny hadcooked up when the rep from the label had asked him what he wanted—if he had a list of requirements before the show. Taj had thought up the most outlandish requests she could think of—perfume to be pumped in the air vents in the newly remodeled toilets, silver M&M’S only—and as a joke had written “Pizza from Grimaldi’s,” the famous New York City shop that she’d visited the one time she was in the city for band camp.
    Neither of them had really believed they would get any of it. And yet weren’t there heaping crystal bowls filled with silver M&M’S everywhere? And Taj would bet that if she visited the bathroom she would be doused in Route du Thé perfume and the porcelain seat would be brand-new. It struck her then that this was truly happening, that it wasn’t a joke anymore, wasn’t a prank that they had pulled on the world.
    Johnny was really going to be a star—he already was a star—the kind of star that spoke for a generation, with music that touched cheerleaders and misfit outcasts alike. Early reviews of the album had compared its genre-shattering appeal to Nirvana’s
Nevermind,
to Public Enemy’s
Fear of a Black Planet,
to Radiohead’s
The Bends.
    Where was he, anyway? Taj knocked on Johnny’s door, and hearing no answer turned the knob and stepped inside.
    â€œOh my God! I’m so sorry!” She backed away from the door, her cheeks crimson. The half-naked couple stirred from the couch. For a panicked heartbeat, Taj had thought it was Johnny, but she could see now that it wasn’t. Thank God.
    The boy on the couch was Sutton Werner, Johnny’s boy-wonder manager. Sutton leaned back, and the girl on his lap, a topless dark-haired beauty, stretched her arms over her head, yawning. Neither seemed particularly bothered by the interruption.
    â€œLooking for Johnny?” Sutton asked, his amber eyes glowing. He was a good-looking guy, except that his eyes were slightly too small, the nose was just slightly too big, and the mouth, a hard line, was almost cruel. Taj, who was an aficionado of eighties teen flicks, thought there was something very James Spader in
Pretty in Pink
about him. Beautiful but repulsive.
    Sutton had come into their lives just like any other fan, as a TAP request, and had been one of the first to pick up on the popularity of Johnny’s songs. Then he had become more than that—he had arranged the impromptu TAP parties, had been the one to bring the record label on board, had booked the Viper Room, had promised them—Was there still a them? Taj wondered—the world.
    â€œYeah, you know where he is?”
    â€œCheck the bathroom.” Sutton said, lazily stroking the girl’s hair.
    â€œThanks.”
    â€œAnd Taj?”
    â€œYeah?”
    â€œTell him it’s all going to be okay. All right? He knows what to do.”
    Taj knocked on the bathroom door.
    â€œCome in,” a gruff voice replied.
    She entered the room. Sure enough she inhaled a massive dose of Barneys-brand perfume.
    Johnny looked up from the sink, where he was preparing the solution. “I knew it was you,” he said. His bangs were plastered to his forehead, and Taj knew if she touched his face, his skin would be damp. She tried not to look upset, not wanting to get into another argument.
    â€œJohnny, what are you doing?” she asked, crossing her arms in front of her chest.
    â€œHooking up,” he said, tying a rubber cord around his forearm, and tightening it.
    â€œI can see that. You don’t need that shit. Who got