Free Reluctantly Charmed by Ellie O'Neill Page A

Nobody had been listening, or, if they had, they hadn’t put the pieces together. Kate McDaid is a common name, after all. It could have been anyone. I let out a deep breath, felt my shoulders fall and relax and my stomach slowly unravel. It was just a normal day in the office.
    Then Marjorie flew toward me at torpedo speed, her face a lopsided mix of bubbling excitement and sadness.
    Oh God, she knows.
    “Did you hear?” she whispered into my ear, overenunciating her words.
    “I heard,” I said, immediately feeling depressed.
    She twirled behind her and grabbed my guests-only chair. Wheeling it almost on top of me, she sat down with a heavy sigh. Now we looked like Siamese twins.
    “It’s just so sad.”
    “Sad? Well, if you mean pathetic sad, yeah, I guess.”
    She let out a little squeak and, even though it seemed impossible, leaned closer. “They say drugs might have been involved.”
    “What?” I nearly fell off my seat. “Drugs?”
    “I know.” She sucked in her cheeks. “What a tragedy. He was only twenty-eight.”
    “No, my dad is at least fifty-eight.”
    “What? Drake Chandler. I’m talking about Drake Chandler. What’s your dad got to do with him?”
    “Drake Chandler, the lead singer of Burning Cradle? The emo guy? What about him?”
    Her whole body erupted. “You mean you don’t know? You haven’t heard?”
    “Well, like, I know who he is, obviously, who doesn’t knowabout Drake Chandler? Didn’t he start off that whole emo movement? He’s responsible for all those teenagers wearing black eyeliner and all that hard rock music.”
    “He’s a god.” Marjorie hung her head dramatically. “He was a god.” She cocked her eyebrow to see if the change of tense had registered with me.
    I nodded, encouraging her to spill the gossip that was moments from gushing out anyway.
    “He’s dead. He was found dead a few hours ago in his mansion in Seattle. It was suicide. Such a tragedy. And the saddest part is, he’d been dead for a few days, swinging from a chandelier. It’s so horrible.”
    I nodded in agreement, picturing his handsome face, which I always knew would have been even more handsome if he’d wiped off some of the makeup. But that’s just me—I’m not into makeup on guys.
    “It’s all over the Internet. Everyone’s saying that the signs were there. The lyrics in his songs were so dark—he was crying out for help.” Marjorie furrowed her brow, as if she could have—maybe even should have—been the one to help him. For a moment I thought about celebrities and how they become so familiar you think you know them and could be the one to connect with them.
    “That’s really sad,” I said. “All his fans are going to be so lost without him.”
    “Look.” She pointed to a large-screen TV in the corner of the office. A small group of guys from the art department were huddled around it shaking their heads in disbelief. The TV was flashing images of Drake Chandler and his house, his band, Burning Cradle, and a depressing shot of a stretcher with a body covered in a white sheet.
    I shivered. “Terrible.”
    “I’ll let you know if I hear anything else,” Marjorie said, standing up from my desk and quickly moving over to the more informed group at the TV.
    It was definitely sad—a sad way to end a life.
    I waved to Matthew. He picked up his phone and nodded toward mine. This was pure laziness—he sat a few feet away.
    “Morning.”
    “Hi. Mad about Drake Chandler, isn’t it?” he said.
    “I know, really sad.”
    “He finally did what he was singing about.”
    “Looks like it.”
    “Did you hear about the note?”
    I looked over at him and saw him unwrap another Starshoot. “No. There was a suicide note?”
    “Yep. Looks like you’re not the only one going on about the fairies.”
    “What? You’re joking.” I cradled the phone to my neck and started typing frantically: “Drake Chandler suicide note.” I clicked onto cnn.com, and there it was. “Have you