What The Cameras Never Saw

He looked between us and said, “it’s either her or me…” He went on and gave an entire speech and proclamation of how much he loved me after that, but only the first five words echoed and repeated in my mind over and over again. Each and every night, I wish I had chosen her. I lost them both in the end anyways.

The room was dark and cold, the silk sheets I wrapped myself in did nothing to keep me warm. The air conditioning whirred in the background right up until it shut off and the entire house fell into absolute silence. All I did was stare at the empty pillow an inch away from my face. He left. Of course he left. Everyone always did. Except Lydia. Tears pricked my eyes and I had to close them to keep the tears at bay but that only brought back flashes of what we used to be. Her laugh. Her scent. The way her red hair was always just a little tangled up in the back. It was my fault. It was all my fault. …

“Chloe! Hurry up!” Lydia was in the car ready to peel away and I was still half asleep. I did my makeup on autopilot and decided that stuffing my hair in a beanie would be better than trying to fix it at that moment. I plopped down in the seat next to her in the car and barely got the door closed before she sped off. We were late for nothing actually important, just some planned paparazzi pictures. Lydia was acting like we were running late for an audition. Our new movie was about two unconventional people falling in love. The filming was done, now the marketing had to start.

My phone buzzed. It was our public relations manager. “Hey Skye, we’re almost there.”

“Put her on speaker!” Lydia hissed at me as she sped through a red light claiming it had been yellow when she’d reached the intersection.

I pressed the speaker button and Skye was rattling off instructions. “Remember, one of you will get out of the car three blocks early. It needs to look like you’re meeting spontaneously.”

“Got it.” Both of us said the words in sync.

“Good. Now Chloe you need to remember, once you’re in the cafe you need to be relatively near the glass when you talk to er- dammit what’s his name?”

Lydia remembered, “His name is Garrison.”

I gasped and jolted awake. Light shone through the thin purple curtains. No Lydia in sight. Garrison should have just stayed a publicity stunt. Paws clambered up my body, Espresso -my cat- nuzzled her head against my chin. My hands stroked her body. “I messed it all up baby” I murmured into her fur. She purred back and then my phone rang.

“Rise and shine Chloe. We’ve got a premiere tonight!” I could hear Skye’s grin and forced myself to at least sound almost as excited as her. It was the least I could do, with the year I’d given her. All the messes she’d covered up…

“Yes it is!” The sugar in my voice made me want to gag, too sweet. I took it down a notch, “When is the styling team coming over?”

“They’re ten minutes away! Get ready! I’ll be over at three, I want to go over some things with you before you hit the carpet.” She hung up.

For years I’d been living in this camera circus. What on Earth did she need to prepare me for? What media trained response did I not already have memorized?

The rest of the day was absolute chaos. I was in a chair in front of a mirror while four people hovered around me like busy bees. A curling iron threatened to burn the back of my neck and the fumes of hairspray and perfume put me in a daze. Risha -my stylist- was slowly losing her mind behind me. I watched her in the mirror pace back and forth while holding four dresses in her hands.

“Let’s go with the red one,” I said. She stopped pacing and came over to hold a long red satin dress next to me. It was a magical piece of work. The neckline was a low v-cut while one strap was purposefully designed to slip just a little of the shoulder. The dress was extremely long, it was a dress that would make headlines.

A wide smile spread across her face. “Yes! Yes! Oh it’s going to look absolutely magical on you and it matches your character so well!”

Yes, it did. My character was extravagant and a pathological liar. Art really did imitate life.

Only a couple minutes passed after I slipped on the dress and was getting some finishing touches before Skye showed up. Her jaw fell open and I grinned. “I look that good eh?”

She shook her head. “I actually came here to give you a bit of a heads up on what to expect at this premiere.” She looked me up and down again, this time with a more critical eye. “Just remember that you look like absolute royalty, so make sure your attitude and expressions only add to that look.”

I rolled my eyes. I’d gotten all of these tips before. “What did you come here to tell me?”

“Lydia will be at the premiere. Reporters will ask both of you questions. Have you spoken to her recently?”

She said it so casually, and yet my mind halted. I used her advice. I looked like royalty, my expression would match. No matter how much my insides wanted to melt, I had to keep my cool. “No, we haven’t spoken since…since everything happened.”

Skye was probably the only person who knew the entire story. She knew my side, she knew Lydia’s side, and I had a feeling she knew Garrison’s side as well. “What should I say when the reporters ask questions about us?”

She pulled out an iPad, cleared her throat, and began to run down a list. “They’re going to ask you questions about your relationship. Some of them are going to ask if you guys are still friends or as close. Some of them will definitely hint at a romantic relationship. Some of them might ask if you two have reconnected since the fiasco.” Skye looked up and she was glaring darts at my soul. “For all of these questions, all you say is: Yes, I love and respect Lydia so much. We’ve worked together for so many years. Now our schedules are a bit different but we’re still very good friends.”

I nodded, barely even present. I did love and respect Lydia, it wasn’t a complete lie. “Is that it?” Skye began tapping her foot against the wooden floor. My jaw clenched. That was not it. I had a feeling whatever she was about to say would be worse than seeing Lydia’s face with the wound still so fresh. “What else?”

Skye said the words at top speed. “Garrison will be attending the premiere as well.”

“What!?” This time I didn’t bother hiding my shock. “Why would Garrison come to my premiere? Everyone knows the engagement got called off! Everyone knows we broke up! Him showing up to my premiere is going to cause a gossip frenzy!”

“Sh. Sh. Sh. Sh.’ Skye gently wrapped her hands around my shoulders. The Stylists slipped out of the room. “It’s just one night. Then you can leave both of them in the past I promise. I will make sure you never attend any sort of event ever again with those two around. Please, you need to be strong. One last push, one last night of lies and you three can sell your story.”

The story we were selling was that Lydia had been madly in love with her straight best friend who had actually been engaged for years to her fiancé Garrison. The lie was as absurd as the truth. The truth was that Garrison and I had been publicly dating as a publicity stunt and all the while Lydia and I had gotten closer and closer. In the end it was all my fault, because I had chosen the cameras and glamour that Garrison promised instead of the love of my life: Lydia.