“I listen to it when I’m down,” she said. “You sing from the heart, I can tell.”
“Your Faith in Me” is about going through something alone but getting through it knowing that someone who isn’t even there believes in you. Her friend started to cry, I guess because she saw how happy Lauren was. It almost made me start, but I fought it because I didn’t want Lauren to think I was sad about her situation. She was a beautiful, happy girl, and I was blessed to meet her. She cared about how I made her feel, not what I looked like.
“We all get down sometimes,” I said. “Can’t appreciate the ups without the downs. Life’s like an elevator, I guess.”
I had this whole plan to bring her onstage to sing with me on “I Wanna Love You Forever,” but security wouldn’t allow it. So instead, I promised to dedicate the song to her.
“Now, when you hear me say your name, I want you to yell so I can see you, okay?” I said. “Don’t leave me up there all on my lonesome.”
During the concert, she yelled her heart out, and I asked everyone to give her a cheer.
“I don’t normally do ‘Your Faith in Me,’ but I don’t want to disappoint you, Lauren.” I said. “Thank you for reminding me why I do what I do. You can lose track sometimes. This song is for people like Lauren, and any of you who feel connected to me through my music. If you feel it, I feel it, too, and you all inspire me to keep on keepin’ on.”
I did a few verses of the song a capella, and I was touched that so many people in the audience knew it well enough to sing along. “Your faith in me, it pulls me through,” we sang into the night air. “When there’s nothing around to hold on to.”
AROUND THAT TIME, I TAPED A DISNEY SPECIAL WITH NICK, AND LOOKING back, I can see the beginning of the “roles” we would later play on our reality show. They filmed us at the beach in L.A., walking with his arm around me. “This is where I like to take Jessica on all our hot dates,” he said. “I’m a real big spender. Three dollars to park.” A wave came in and almost got our feet, so I screamed. We were just goofy and fun.
They set up a thing where some tween girls were sitting with me out on the beach, having girl talk. I remember this little cutie with a sweet face straight up asked me, “Do you think that less guys come to your concerts and stuff because they know that you have a boyfriend?”
I was a little taken aback by such a marketing-focused question from a kid. Who taught you to think that way? I wondered. Sony?
“That’s a good question,” I said, stalling. “I don’t think that every guy is coming to my concert because they think they can be my boyfriend. I think that they come because they like to watch the show and they want to have a lot of fun. You know?”
Tommy Mottola disagreed. I had to look like somebody the boys wanted to be with. In a word, hotter. In July, we started work on my next album, and Tommy wanted to go all in on making me a combo of Britney and Mariah. He said he would be even more involved this time and said I needed to be doing more dance pop over the ballads I loved. I also had to get even skinnier. I started the Atkins diet hardcore, envying and resenting anybody who could just eat. Off the diet, I obsessed over how I looked 24/7; on the diet, I was also hyperfocused on food. It made me nervous. My anxiety had something to hold on to, and instead of examining my emotions, I could just block them out by focusing on carb counts and waist sizes. If I focused on controlling my outward appearance, I could avoid thinking about my emotions and fears.
My mother sometimes, with the best of intentions, fed into it. Her aerobics-teacher past would kick in, seeing a problem to fix and giving a solution she thought would help. When she urged me to exercise or told me she was going for a long walk and maybe I should come along, I knew what she meant. We ended up doing the Atkins diet together.
I was still out there promoting the first album, and in so many interviews I ended up talking about food and my diet. I had no filter and would say whatever was on my mind or slipped out of my mouth, whether it was about my strict diet or how irritating it was to be constantly compared to Britney and Christina. The marketing department thought it was too much of a peek behind the curtain on what it was really like to be a pop star. The label finally decided I needed media training after I did an interview with the CBS Early Show at the Arthur Ashe Kids’ Day, a concert that kicks off the U.S. Open every year in August. I have to admit that I did not know who Arthur Ashe was. Now I know he was one of the greatest tennis players in the world and the first African American man to win Wimbledon. When he came out as HIV positive in 1992, he created an impact that lasted long beyond his death a year later. But back then, I just showed up and sang where people told me to. 98 Degrees was going to perform, so I was excited to sing with Nick again. I barely knew who any of the tennis players were, even Pete Sampras and Andre Agassi.
During the interview before the concert, the tennis players and us singers stood off-stage, and we were each asked what it meant to be there to celebrate Arthur Ashe’s impact. “I’m just so proud to be here and to give back,” I said, and then turned to Andre Agassi. “This is such a great event you put on.”
Andre’s eyes widened in a look of “I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Everyone, including the news crew, realized I thought Andre was Arthur Ashe. The late Arthur Ashe.
That was the last straw for Columbia, and they made me do media training. It was awful. Imagine My Fair Lady, where they fire questions at you, completely random ones. I had to learn how to manipulate the conversation back to music, the reason you’re doing forty-five interviews a day in the first place. It felt false to me, but I couldn’t deny that I would lose the thread on every interview and spill my guts. An innocent question from a teen mag about Christmas plans would lead to me talking about my family missing Sarah and how we were all still grieving so the holidays were hard on us. Merry Christmas, kids! Or a journalist would point out that Britney and Christina seemed to be struggling with fame, and I would just take that bait and say that I thought Britney was the nicest girl but maybe Christina didn’t need to have her security clear an entire hallway of staff and talent just so she could walk through it alone. I was too honest to play the game.
As you know, media training never really worked on me. Thank God. Part of it was that I was just so sheltered. I was trying everything to get on MTV, a channel that was forbidden to me as a kid. Then, as I grew up, I kept my head down working, so I didn’t understand the most basic things about pop culture.
I grew closer to CaCee Cobb, the woman in Teresa’s office who’d always hounded me about the homework for my GED. Our relationship was mostly on the phone. She also had to keep calling to track us down because we’d once again moved into another staged home or because Teresa needed to send potential tracks to wherever we’d landed. I was one to procrastinate, and CaCee’s “you have to” was nonnegotiable. Still, when she called, I would always find reasons to have small talk with her, stalling whatever task she was going to give me.
“What did you do this weekend?” I asked her.
“I had some friends over to watch Sex and the City,” CaCee said.
“What’s that?”