Somewhere In Neverland (Sequel to Oh, Calamity)

Circles

Marina's POV:

I took a sip of my latte. Today was another day off in South Carolina, with the luxury of a hotel. Unfortunately, we weren't there yet, so I was using my billing and budgeting time in the back lounge. I had my Macbook Air open and resting on my lap. I had already made breakfast for Alex, and it was just sitting in the toaster oven at this point to keep warm. I was typing away, looking for my credit score. It was nearly perfect at the moment. My finances were in ship-shape.

Out of curiousity, I decided to look at the album sales. I could access them through Billboard. Holy shit. They were even bigger than expected. I was a tad bit shocked at how much money we were recieving, because it just didn't match up with what we were actually getting. I decided to dig in a little deeper.

I found my contract saved as a document on my computer. I'm glad I did, because it didn't add up. All four of us girls would recieve 20%, and the record company would grab the other 20% for nessecary tour payments and advertising. Hopeless Records was always really great about staying true to the contract, so I wondered, why was this all of the sudden a problem? I did the math on my texas instrument, and was completely bullshitted. Since back in October, we hadn't been receiving quite what we made. I decided to call the record company, keeping my cool. The money didn't mean shit to me; it was the fact that someone was trying to rip us off. It was insulting, like we were stupid.

"Hopeless Records. What can I help you with today?" A secretary asked.

"Yes, I need to speak to Louis immediately." I inquired.

"Mr. Posen," She corrected. "Is in a meeting right now. I can take a message."

"Tell him he might have a lawsuit with his label's biggest band." I hissed.

"Marina?"

"Who else would it be?" 

"I'll forward you to him right away." She said, sounding scared. Was I really that intimidating?

"Hello?" I heard a man say over the line.

"Louis, what the hell is going on?" I asked. "I was looking into our album sales, and they do not match up with what we've actually been recieving."

He paused. "What are you talking about?"

"Have you actually reviewed our contract recently?"

"Yeah, every time you have a sales spike."

"Then tell me why I've been getting ten percent!"

"Marina, calm down. I'm sure there's a perfectly reasonable explaination for this. All I know is that we sent you the correct amount of money. There is a possibility that someone in your inner circle is distributing incorrectly."

"Do you have any proof to back you up?" I asked.

"Yeah, I can fax you photo copies of the original checks we sent. How far back has this gone to?" He offered a solution.

"October."

"That's a really long time."

"Well I'm sorry that I was preoccupied!"

"I know, I know. I'm gonna send you to Natalie now, just so she can fax you everything."

"Okay. I wanna trust you, Louis."

"I promise that you can."

I heard the tone change. "Marina, hey, what do you need?"

"I need all of the band's checks from October faxed to me."