Somebody by Natalie La Rose feat. Jeremih

"I wanna rock with somebody. I wanna take shots with somebody. I wanna leave with somebody; and we ain't gotta tell nobody, we ain't gotta tell nobody."

~~~

"Thanks for doing that, Mr. Franco," she says as she steps out of Tom's building.

"Did you seriously just call me Mr. Franco?" His eyebrows curl up sardonically but his grin says it all.

Red heat creeps up Allison's cheekbones.

"Call me James. Everybody does." He laughs.

"Okay, James," she says, trying it out loud for the first time.

It rolls off her tongue perfectly, almost like she's meant to say it every day of her life. She wishes she could.

They find themselves right by the stairs to a subway and James stops.

"This is where I stop. But since you're gonna stick around LA, we should get together sometime. Maybe this week?" A sly grin slides onto his face. "Here's my number." He hands her a folded slip of paper and she takes it. "Please don't give it to anyone. I love my fans, but I don't need phone calls from every one of them," he says, offering a suppressed laugh.

"Of course not." She's breathless. James-fucking-Franco just gave her his personal number.

"Cool. Hey, I'm going to a friend's party tonight, and I'd like you to come." He gives her a smile and leans on the green railing that leads to the subway.

"Tonight?"

"Short-notice, I know, and I'm sorry, but I think you're one of those special people."

"One of them? I thought special meant something like one in a million." In return, she gives him a playful smirk.

His eyebrows furrow and he looks down in deep thought. "Does it not? There're more than one million people in the world, Allison," he says seriously.

Her heart breaks. He sounds like he's lost someone special.

"So," he says, breaking her silence, "are you coming?"

"Yeah, I'll be there." Mentally, she clears everything off her to-do list.

Guess I won't unpack until tomorrow.

"Awesome. See you there." He winks one last time before he begins to jog off down the green stairs.

"Wait, James! Aren't you forgetting something?"

He furrows his eyebrows again as he looks up, hurried pedestrians flowing around him looking annoyed. Allison rolls her eyes jokingly.

"I need to know where it's at, dummy."

"Right."

~~~

Checking her makeup for what must be the tenth time, Allison decides she'd stalled enough. She heads out to her car, getting in and buckling up. It takes her an hour to arrive at the party; she's afraid James had already forgotten about her.

It's definitely a celebrity party; there's a bouncer she had to sign in with at the front door. Sure enough, James had put her name on the list, although it was misspelled.

Meandering through the overcrowded house which is booming with loud rap music and neon lights flowing out of the windows, she tries to avoid getting hit on by drunken houseguests. She finds the host, Lana del Rey, chatting it up at the minibar.

With a surge of confidence, Allison yells out Lana's name over the music and casually walks up to her, trying to control her own heart as it thumps in her throat. LA is exciting, but she didn't exactly expect to be having actual conversations with James Franco and Lana del Rey.

"Hey, hun. Can I get you a drink?" Lana asks sweetly, after taking her Marlboro out from between her red lips.

"Not at the moment." The nervous Allison takes a deep breath. "I was invited by James Franco, and I was wondering where I could find him at."

"You must be the girl he was talking about. What's your name?"

He talked about me? To Lana del Rey? Holy shit!

"I'm Allison Bradshaw," she chokes out over her excitement.

"I see. You know, you're even prettier than he said you were." Lana takes another drag and looks her over carefully.

"Oh, thank you."

He said I was pretty?

"Any idea where I can find him at?"

Smiling, Lana says, "Oh, he's probably grinding on some girl. I actually think I saw him downstairs a few minutes ago."

~~~

She finds James, thankfully not grinding on someone, sitting on the couch in the basement, nursing a glass of white wine.

"Hey, James."

He stands up from his spot on the leather couch. "Allie, right?"

"It's Allison." She admits to herself that she kind of likes the new nickname.

"Right. Come sit." He motions you over to the couch and pats the seat next to him. "Guys, this is Allison," he yells over the increasingly loud rap emanating from a closed door on the same floor.

A chorus of heys greet her, but one man with light brown hair goes, "So this is Franc's new girl?"

"Oh, shut up, Bentley. She isn't my girlfriend. I met her this morning outside of Tom's." James waves him off and takes another sip of his wine.

"All the more reason to fuck her," Bentley says with a smirk.

You're appalled, but James becomes infuriated.

"I said shut up, Bentley."

"Fine, I'll shut up... After you give me proof that you fucked her." He elbows a guy next to him who moves away as Bentley laughs it off.

At this, James stands up and punches Bentley in the nose. Hard. An ominous crack reverberates off of every wall and people stare at James. He walks over to the bleeding Bentley and yanks him up by the collar of his shirt.

"You won't say that again. You won't rape her. You won't look at her, you won't even breathe the air around her." His voice gets low. "You come sniffing around her and I'll turn you in for continued sexual and verbal harassment, which I don't think your parole officer will like very much. Do I make myself clear?"

When Bentley doesn't answer, James repeats himself.

"Did I make myself clear, Bentley? Or will I have to break another one of your bones?" His hand flexes and his brown eyes focus intensely on the bloody face before him.

"No, no, James," begs Bentley. "Please put me down," he says in a small voice.

James releases Bentley, then stares around the room.

"Everybody out. Get out." He waves everyone off calmly. As people head upstairs, he grabs Allison's arm and asks her to stay.

"Sure," comes her answer. He brings her over to he couch and she sits with him.

"I'm sorry you had to see that. Bentley thinks he's still in the tenth grade."

"I appreciate it." She lays a hand on his arm. "Suddenly having to make a name for myself in the celebrity world is harder than it looked."

"When I got mixed in with all of these 'badass' celebs, I thought it was tough, too."

For what to her seems like seconds, they talk about friends and family and food and politics, downing the occasional Jell-O shot here and there. People flow in and out of the rooms on that floor, drunk and rowdy but conscious enough to know that they don't want a broken nose- so they keep their hands to themselves.

"And one day, I told him it was over, that I wasn't taking his shit anymore," Allison finishes a conversation about old lovers.

He turns to her, carefully examining her hazel-green eyes, then begins to lean in. She knows what's happening, but she's not sure what to do. She doesn't know if she wants this. But he's so close-

Suddenly, he sits back and clears his throat awkwardly.

She looks at the closest clock, seeing that it's almost twelve thirty in the morning. He catches her glance, then says, "You wanna stay here tonight?"

"I'd better not."

"You can sleep in my bed. People are gonna be here for a few more hours at the least. I won't let anyone touch you."

"Your bed?"

"Oh, this is my house. Lana's just a live-in friend."

"But you promise not to let anyone come in?"

"I promise."

~~~

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