All right, all right,” Tina called before the cameras snapped on. “Last week, Oprah’s ratings topped mine. Let’s make sure that it doesn’t happen again, all right?” She turned to face Paige and tossed her hair over her shoulder.
As soon as the cameras started rolling, a plastic smile appeared on Tina’s face. “Hello, everyone, it’s another hour of ‘Primetime Live.’ My first guest is author, Paige Turner, who’s been getting a lot of buzz recently. Paige…why don’t you tell us a little about Open Book?”
“Open Book is a book that shouldn’t even exist, honestly,” Paige responded, glancing at the cameras only once in awhile. It was easier to focus on Tina than it was to focus on the cameras. “I wrote a romance novel that I was supposed to turn in. I had both that novel and my diary typed on disk. The wrong disk was turned in and my diary ended up being published.”
“At what point did you realize that your diary was published?”
“The first stop on my book tour was in Florida. When I saw the book cover, I noticed that the cover didn’t really fit the premise for the romance novel I’d written, so I read the back cover and I seriously came close to fainting.”
“You had to be mortified!” Tina exclaimed, bringing a hand up to her chest.
Paige smiled and nodded. “It was…pretty humiliating. My agent told me that I could have the books pulled off of the shelves and that sounded very appealing to me.”
“So…what convinced you to keep the books on the shelves?” Tina leaned closer to Paige and asked in a stage whisper, “Was it the money?”
“No, Tina, umm…actually it was a woman I met on one of my flights. She told me how much the book helped her, how she felt as if she wasn’t alone in some of the things that she had gone through. At that point, I would have felt guilty taking the books off of the shelves, because I would have been doing that for selfish reasons.”
Tina nodded, her eyes sliding to the teleprompter placed over Paige’s shoulder. “So the content of Open Book…it’s your diary. All of the skeletons you’ve had in your closet, everything wrong you’ve done. All of your dirt is in this book?” She lifted the book from the low, wooden table that stood between the two overstuffed, puke-pink chairs.
“Yeah…all of my dirt is definitely there,” Paige said, dropping her eyes to her lap.
“Now…the tone in your voice changed,” Tina said, sitting up a bit straighter and setting the book on the table. “Could that be because of the rumors flying around that you were recently in a relationship with the teacher you talk about in this book?”
Paige’s mouth dropped open and her eyes widened. She turned towards the studio audience. Because there were microphones suspended several feet above their heads, their gasps were more defined. “I, um…you didn’t prep me for that question,” she said under her breath.
“I mean, Paige…the way I see it, we all know a lot of your dirt anyway, so what’s the point in trying to keep anything concealed, right?” Tina’s smile was sweet enough to cause cavities. She turned to her audience and asked, “We want all the juicy details, right?”
Her audience backed her up.
Paige grimaced and rubbed at the back of her neck. “That’s a very sensitive topic.”
“We have time,” Tina said with mock-patience.
Paige uncomfortably shifted in her seat. “I, um…”
“You had a crush on your teacher when you were high school, isn’t that correct?”
“I had great admiration for a particular teacher, yes,” Paige clarified.
“We know how you felt. All we have to do is read the book,” Tina said, grinning.
Paige indulged in a five-second fantasy of wiping the grin from Tina’s face. “I developed feelings for him.”
“And at such a young age.” Tina clucked her tongue. “Now, recently, you and he were an item, weren’t you?”
Paige squirmed again. “I really don’t want to-”
“That’s what the rumor mills are saying anyway,” Tina surged on. “Word on the rumor mill is that you and this teacher became an item, but he didn’t know that you used to be his student. He didn’t even know that you were the renowned author, Paige Turner, did he?”
“Where did you get that information?” Paige demanded angrily.
“From reliable sources. Is the information correct?”
“I-It wasn’t like…it was more like…”
“I also heard that he dumped you once he found out the truth, because he couldn’t deal with dating a former student.”
Paige stood from her seat. “This interview is over,” she said through clenched teeth.
“So you’d rather let everyone get their information from the rumor mills?” Tina taunted, still seated in her chair. “You don’t want the people to hear your version of the story?
“I…” Paige glanced at the audience again. Everyone was on the edge of their seats. They wanted to hear her story. She sighed and took her seat, folding her hands in her lap. “I, umm…I’ve made some mistakes in my life. Not telling him that I used to be his student was one of them. And yes, the rumors are correct. He did dump me after he found out the truth. I’m not angry or resentful for it…I deserved that.”
“There you have it,” Tina said, turning to face the audience. “You’ve gotten the story here first, on ‘Primetime Live.’ Open Book is in stores now. Go out, buy it, and thank God that your life isn’t as horrific as Paige’s.”
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