Selfishness Squared

"Ok. Give me your best smile!" She said before starting the record of my weekly video.

I started to play the opening keys of "If I Ain't Got You", and began to sing.

I love to sing, and I can play several instruments, including the piano, acoustic and electric guitar, saxophone, violin, and drums. I frequently make video covers of good songs and I post all of them on youtube. I've been getting good hits lately, and this has motivated me to make more. You see, like the usual person, I dream of hitting big and becoming famous someday.

I am Ryan Andersons, 23 years of age, and this is how my story goes...

"Ryan, look, you have more than 500,000 hits on your latest video! The one where you covered Chris Brown's "Say Goodbye"." Natalie Drewman, my girlfriend of 5 years now, exclaimed to me as she sat cross-legged on the bed, using the laptop to browse through my youtube account.

"Really? Lemme see!" I scrambled to her side which jostled her a little.

"Yup! See? The number of your subscribers has seriously gone up too!" She pointed out.

"You're right, Allie. Woah! There are 32 more subscribers now." I gave a low whistle for myself. "Just above 200 subscribers..."

"Well, love,  you have posted a lot of videos, so I guess it's just about right that you're getting quite some attention now." Allie said. "Maybe you'll get noticed soon..."

Noticed, huh? I knew what she meant. I only joined youtube about 4 months ago, but I already have quite the fame. Some bigshots are bound to notice, I suppose? I grinned at her, "You think so? Well, I'm not quite sure, but of course, I'm hoping for it!"

"It would really be great if that happens. You'd be one step closer to your dream!" She put her arms around me as she finished speaking.

"That would be a nice picture, love. I wonder if it'll ever be real..." I said slowly as I stared at Allie's beautiful face.

"Oh, shush! What happened to all that optimism?" She looked me in the eye as she gave me a scolding.

I brushed some stray hair from her face. "I could use some moments to actually think realistically."

"I'm sure it's not that far off, Ryan. You'll reach your dream... And I'll always be here to support you all the way.." She gave me a sweet smile.

That was how we were. Hopeful, despite the uncertainty of the future. Until a month and a half later....

 "I'll be heading out to the groceries, you need anything, love?" Allie asked as she prepared herself to leave.

"Some softdrinks would be fine. And don't forget chips." I told her as she headed for the door.

I decided to follow her outside to the living room. She went to the kitchen and opened the fridge to inspect its contents.

"Hmmm. Seems we're running out of this....and that...." I heard her murmur.

I sat down on the couch and absentmindedly flipped through the channels on the television as I turned on the laptop to check on my Youtube account.

Allie was still in the kitchen when I was checking the latest updates on my videos. Seems my subscribers has increased in number again, and my videos are getting more and more hits. I checked on some of the latest comments. Most of them were compliments from various people, others were requests for certain songs, then of course, there were those comments from haters. I didn't mind those hate comments, they go with being in the territory.

It would be time for a Q&A soon, so I focused mostly on the question comments, and copied some of them into the Notepad. The comments were particularly interesting with my video from two weeks ago. It was sort of a music video of Stevie Hoang's "Changes" that I made with Allie. In fact, it seemed to have the most hits out of all my videos so far, and it was only two weeks ago! How cool was that? Anyway, a lot of girls were commenting, "Is that your girlfriend?". Some were even saying that they wished they were my girlfriend instead. Then there were those comments from guys saying, "Nice girl, bro! A real beauty." It all made me quite amused, so I decided to include that in my Q&A.

I was still in the middle of choosing the questions when the telephone began to ring. Allie hurriedly closed the fridge to answer it. She was still holding the pad of paper and the pen she was using to list down the things she had to buy at the grocery.

"Andersons Residence. How may I help you?" She was as cheerful and formal as ever in answering phone calls. I used to teased her that she sounded like a hotel receptionist or something.

I went on with what I was doing, while vaguely listening to what she was saying.

"May I know who's calling?" She went on. Suddenly she dropped the paper and pen she was holding and gave a low gasp. "StarMusic Studios?" She barely squeeked, which was so out of character for her when talking to strangers on the phone.

But I heard it clearly though it was hardly above a whisper. The words had me on full alert right away and I looked in Allie's direction. She beckoned me to come over.

"Yes, yes. He's here." She was saying.

I immediately stood up and went to her. She gave me the phone and looked at me with mix of shock and glee. Then she bent down to pick up the things she dropped.

"This is Ryan Andersons speaking. You asked for me?" What the...? I was sounding a lot like Allie. I chided myself. She sure was rubbing off on me, but I guess it was probably the only response appropriate for talking with, and I really can't believe it's really them, StarMusic Studios personnel.

"Yes. Yes. Great to finally have you on line. This is probably informal, but we had no other way to contact you, Mr. Andersons." The person on the other end was saying.

I hastily replied. "Oh no, it's ok, really. I guess it's not easy to locate someone, even with the powers of the internet nowadays."

The person laughed. "That is true. We were lucky enough that you provided contact on your Google+ account. We didn't want to result to emails, you see. We weren't sure if you might think of those as scams or fake emails. Those do seem to be common now."

"I have to agree with that. I would have been hesitant to answer if you had contacted me via email." I admitted.

He gave another jolly laugh. "Well, I was right about that then."

"Yes. So, what is the reason for your call, Mister...?" I hesitated.

"I apologize, it seems I forgot to introduce myself. I am Mr. Wells. And I called to tell you that Sir Raffy has developed an interest in your talents. Your youtube videos had been brought to his attention by some managers who are interested to get you, you see. And he wants to schedule a meeting with you. I'm sure you've heard of him, Mr. Raffy, or Ralphonson Steel of StarMusic Studios." Mr. Wells said.

Ralphonson Steel? One of the main executives of StarMusic Studios? The one responsible for making talented nobodies into nobody-doesn't-know-your-name somebodies? THAT Ralphonson Steel? He wants to meet with ME? I must be dreaming.

"Oh, uhm, sure. When would that be?" I tried to keep my composure.

"On the 28th, which would be 10 days from now. That is if you find the date manageable." Mr. Wells. told me.

"Oh, it's fine. The time and place would be?" I asked.

He answered promptly, "9:00 in the morning, at the Chateau des Reves, at the VIP Lounge on the top floor."

"Ok. Thanks, anything else?" I said.

"That is all, Mr. Andersons. Looking forward to see you." He replied.

"Thanks, Mr. Wells. Goodbye." I said.

"Adieu." He said before the line finally went dead.

I took a deep breath, but was by surprise upon realizing that Allie was standing right behind me.

"So......? How was it....?" She asked slowly.

I took a few more breaths to steady myself, then I grinned at her.

She understood already, of course, and threw her arms around me. "Oh, Ryan! I'm so happy for you!" I wrapped my own arms around her. She looked at me and beamed a smile. "Tonight we are going to celebrate!"

"That would be great!" I told her.

She stepped out of my arms then and said, "Well, I gotta hurry to the groceries now, so I could start preparing our little celebration."

I smiled at her. "Sure. Go ahead and hurry or I'm gonna starve to death!"

She pouted a little. "You're always starving!" But she was laughing as she left.

The day for the meeting finally came...

I was waiting in the VIP Lounge as Mr. Wells told me, and Allie sat beside me, fidgeting with her bracelets.

I took her arm and squeezed it. She looked at me then. I smiled at her. "Hey, C'mon, this is it! The real deal!"

She smiled weakly in response. "Yeah, I know. I'm happy for you, really. But.."

I cut her off. "You know, it's like you're the one signing up for something big and not me. Ain't I suppsed to be the one all nervous and doubtful?" I grinned at her.

Finally she laughed and took a deep breath. "You're right. I don't even know what I'm nervous for. I mean, I just can't believe it's finally happening!"

"Yeah. Exactly." I said.

We had arrived at the hotel 20 minutes before the meeting time, but when 9:00 AM came, only a harried-looking guy who looked to be in his 50s came to the lounge. He immediately made a beeline to us and introduced himself as Mr. Wells.

"I apologize that Mr. Raffy is not here yet, he has been caught up in a meeting. He'll be here soon enough." He told me as he occupied the edge of the couch across from us. "I am his assistant, just so you know. So I rushed here ahead to inform you of his current predicament."

"That's ok, uh, I understand he's a really busy man, and a successful one at that." I said. "I wouldn't want to get in the way of his daily affairs."

After about 45 minutes of waiting, finally some people came into the lounge. Mr. Wells immediately stood up to lead them to where we were.

"Sir Raffy, here is Mr. Andersons." Mr. Wells motioned to me as they all sat down.

"Yes, it's a pleasure to meet you sir." I said.

"Indeed it is." Mr. Raffy said. "I've heard about your growing fame in youtube. It has come to my attention that you definitely have talent which deserves to be showcased to the world."

"I am flattered that you think that way, sir." I told him.

"Yes, well, it is rare for me to meet with clients myself this days, often I leave that to the managers, they only get to meet me when they're already famous all around the world. You are lucky." He told me.

"Thanks sir." I said.

"So let's gets straight to the point. I want StarMusic Studios to be in charge of your career." He said.

"I don't know what to say, sir. I am greatly flattered." I said.

"If you agree to this, Danny here will be your manager. He will be in charge of all your actions in the music industry, everything." He motioned to the bald man of the age around 40s, who was sitting beside him.

"I assure you, you will be in capable hands with me. I'll make you world-famous in no time!" Danny said.

"Thank you, I don't doubt that you indeed can." I smiled.

The three men then went on to the finer details of the start of my career. They even decided that it would be better to cut my name shorter, "Rye", instead of "Ryan".

"All you have to do is agree and sign these papers." Raffy said, and Mr. Wells. handed me some papers.

I read them and signed after a while. I gave them back to Mr. Wells.

"Well, I guess we have a done deal. Your journey to the top starts now." Raffy offered his hand for me to shake.

How true his words were, I did become famous quickly. StarMusic Studios made me into one of the biggest stars. "Rye Andersons" was a name that filled the world of showbiz. I became busy right away, Danny filled my schedule with lots of guestings, meetings, music video shootings and of course, lots of recordings. I barely had time for myself.

After a few months....

"Ryan, I have to tell you something." She said.

"Can we save that for later? I need to get to the studio in less than 10 minutes or Danny is going to flip out on me again." I told her as I rushed to get to the front door.

"It's important." She insisted as she followed me to the garage.

"Later. I promise. I gotta scram now." I gave her a kiss on the forehead before getting in the car.

She sighed in defeat. "Ok. Goodbye. Stay safe, love."

"You too, love."

That night, as we were eating dinner, Allie started again. "Is now a good time to talk?"

"Sure. What about, love?" I said in between spooning food into my mouth.

She began "Well, it's about-" My phone suddenly started ringing.

"Hold on." I told her before answering the phone.

"Rye, boy, congratulations! The sales of your debut album has finally reached platinum record!" Danny said over the phone.

"That's great! I can't believe I would even get to that point!" I exclaimed.

Danny continued on, "But that's not all. A lot of bigshots took notice of your talent, so in a few months, they decided to sponsor a concert for you! You really hit it big this time, my boy!"

"Well, all I can say is 'Wow'. It all feels so unreal." I laughed.

"Better start believing then. You're gonna begin rehearsing tomorrow. Your schedule's gonna be really packed now, so I'll make sure your working time is properly managed. You gotta make sure to get a good rest these days. Starting today." He said.

I chuckled. "Sure thing, Danny. Well, have a good night."

I hung up the phone and told Allie the big news. "Allie, love, this is it! I finally hit it big!"

"Oh, that's wonderful!" She said as she gave me a hug.

"Yeah, well, let's finish dinner so that we could head to bed soon." And I remembered our cut-off conversation. "Oh, what was it you were saying a while ago?"

She smiled. "It's nothing. Let's talk about that another time."

The next days that passed were a pretty busy time for me, and then finally, the concert came.

"Good luck, love, but I'm sure you're gonna be great out there." Allie said with a smile.

I pulled her in for a kiss before responding, "Thanks, love."

Suddenly Danny appeared in the doorway of my dressing room. "Your first number's gonna start in 15 minutes, we gotta go now, Rye."

"Are you sure you don't want to use the VIP seat reserved for you?" I asked Allie.

She answered, "Yeah, I'd rather watch the live broadcast on the flatscreen here in your room."

"Well, ok, if you say so." I said.

She squeezed my hand before letting me go. I gave her a last smile before leaving the room.

The concert proceeded better than I expected it to. The audience were screaming for an encore when I finally finished my last song, and since it was my first concert anyway, Danny consented for the encore. All my fans screamed in delight as the first few notes of my song began to play, then they all went quiet as I started singing the first line.

When the concert finally ended, I was already so beat, but I couldn't help but be overjoyed by the fact that everyone who went to the concert left with a smile on their face. That was more than enough to keep me moving on my feet.

I got back to my dressing room and found Allie asleep on the couch. I planted a kiss on her forehead and gently nudged her shoulder. She awoke to this and retracted her legs to get into a sitting position so that I could sit beside her.

I wrapped my arms around her and asked, "Is anything wrong, love? I noticed you've been tired a lot lately."

She snuggled up to me and replied, "Well, it's actually because-"

The sound of the door opening cut her off. Then Danny appeared in the doorway.

"Rye, great work out there. I'm sure you're very tired now, so the van's all ready to bring you home." Danny told me.

I replied as I stood up. "Thanks, Danny." And to Allie, I offered my hand to help her stand and said, "Let's go, so that we can both have some rest."

Soon we were already home. I was just glad that I had enough strength left to take a shower just before hitting the sacks.

Just as I was drifting to sleep, I mumbled to Allie, who was lying next to me, "So why are you often tired again?"

She then told me, "Go to sleep, love."

And soon enough, I was.

I woke up the next morning to find a note left on the dresser. It was written in Allie's beautiful handwriting.

"I went to church today and will be going to see a doctor right after. I won't be back until noon."

"Noon huh? Well, it's 10 in the morning now." I said to myself.

It was my day off from my busy schedule, because it was the post-concert, and Danny said he wanted me to relax for today. So I went to the kitchen to cook breakfast for myself. And as I began to eat, I thought of Allie's note. It said she went to the doctors, and that made me worry that she might be sick. After all, she has been tired lately. It has been 7 months since I started this career, so I hadn't really had much chance to check up on her. I hoped fervently that nothing was wrong with her or her health. We've been together for quite some time now, and I decided that maybe it was time for those wedding bells. I gotta buy the perfect ring soon.

After cleaning up my mess in the kitchen, I stayed in the living room to watch some show that could keep me occupied while waiting for Allie to come home.

A little after 12, I finally heard the sound of her car approaching.

The front door eventually opened.

"How was church, love? You should have woken me up so that I could go with you." I told her as she closed the front door.

She smiled at me. "It was fine. You needed your rest. By the way, Ryan, I need to talk to you."

"Sure, what about?" I asked her.

She took a seat beside me on the couch. "Well, I think you should lay off your career for a while."

This caught me off guard. "Why?"

"I just visited the doctor and he advised me not to do much work. He said that I really need someone to take care of me for now."

"I'm sure we can find some way around it. I mean, we could get a maid or such, I don't think leaving my career would be necessary." I told her.

Then she shocked me with what she said next. "Ok, if that's how you feel. Atleast now I know that your career is more important to you than I am."

I tried to reason with her. "Allie, you know that's not what I mean. Please don't take it that way... You know very well that this has been my dream ever since.."

"Yes, I do know that, and I've always supported you, but I think you've gone too far, Ryan, you haven't even realized how much you've neglected me... You barely even have time to listen to me when we need to talk." She retorted.

"Allie.... You know that's not true. I'm doing this for both of us. For our future together...." I pleaded.

"You think you're doing it for us, but the truth is, you're doing it for yourself. For your own selfish desires of becoming world-reknown. None of this was for the two of us at all...because if it was, you would have noticed back then..." She stood up and hurried to the room we shared.

She started packing up her things.

"Love, what are you doing?" I asked, full of fear.

She took a while before answering. I stayed silent at the doorway as she went on packing.

"What do you think?" She zipped her bags. "I'm leaving." She said as she left the room with her bags. I followed her.

"Allie, love, please don't do this to me....to us...." I hugged her from behind and this brought her to a pause, but I realized that she was already in front of the door.

She didn't turn around to face me, but she did sigh out loud before finally speaking.

"Let's just stop this, Ryan... No, you're not Ryan anymore, are you? You're Rye... And Rye has to go and continue his path to fame..." She broke into tears and went on, "I don't want me and the baby growing in my womb to get in your way,.. Goodbye Rye..." With that she opened the door and slammed it shut...