She holds up her phone, which is already playing a clip of a news anchor in a powder blue suit. Lena’s face flashes onscreen, followed by Jake Tisdale in oversized sunglasses; together, they look like the most photogenic felons ever. “The Argentine press thinks I’m engaged to Jake,” she says, delighted.
“Are you?”
She shrugs. “I have no memory of a proposal.”
We cackle in tones born of barely surviving Juilliard’s sophomore spring and trust-fund theater kids who thought crying on cue was a personality. There is comfort in the gross stuff, the unsurfaced love. For two minutes, we are just Lena and Emma, not famous people, not warring Instagram algorithms.
Then there’s a knock, and an assistant with a clipboard pokes her head in. “They want you by the pool for group shots in five.”
Lena winks at me. “Back to the meat grinder. Asher better be out there. I want to inspect him before you claim it’s over.”
She grabs my arm and pulls me through the party’s nerve center, where the bodies multiply, and the air turns heady with expectation. Asher is, of course, already at the edge of the crowd, hands in his pockets and posture calculatedly casual, like he’s auditioning for a magazine cover called “Effortlessly Handsome.” When his gaze finds me, it’s the same jolt as before, like stepping into sunshine after a week in the dark.
Lena sizes him up with a smirk so obvious I consider warning him, but the glint in his eye says he’s ready and, probably, amused.
“Mr. Dixon. I’m Lena, and I’ll be conducting tonight’s performance review.”
He gives her a hand to shake—a real one, not the floppy “so nice to meet you” kind. “Happy to be here. Are you the jealous best friend or secretly in love with her?”
She grins. “Both. Sometimes in the same night.”
They spar for a minute, barbs circling each other. I watch the party noise fade to the background: the hum of drone cameras, the filtered laughter, the flash of pool lights on well-oiled skin. The world is suddenly smaller, limited to the triangle of us.
Asher breaks first. “Emma says you just got back from Argentina. Did you bring her anything illegal?”
Lena looks at me. “Did you tell him?”
“Tell me what?” His gaze flicks between us.
She leans in conspiratorially. “She’s a lightweight. One glass of Malbec and she’s singing Hamilton.”
I shoot her a look. “That was one time. And you spiked it with Fernet.”
He looks at me, delighted. “Noted.”
Across the pool, the master of ceremonies—a man who once fired his stylist for a poorly tied bowtie—waves us over. Lena pushes us forward, then pauses, whispering to me, “I’ll handle the piranhas. You two go be disgusting. But you have exactly one hour before I come bail you out.”
I want to protest that we’re not “disgusting,” but already she’s absorbed by a knot of execs debating the virtues of AI and virtual reality in cinema. Asher and I are left at the edge of the party, surrounded by the riotous scent of jasmine and 300-watt ambition.
I glance at him. “You passed inspection. Congratulations.”
He steps closer, keeping just enough distance for plausible deniability. “That felt like a real trial. Does she always interview your fake boyfriends?”
“Only the good ones,” I say, and my voice comes out softer than I mean. “Sorry about the grilling.”
He shrugs. “It’s show business. I expected to be on TMZ with a half-life of forty-eight hours. Your friend is more interesting.”
I don’t have a script for this part. Throughout my professional life, I’ve been coached on how to handle co-stars, fans, and even hostile bloggers, but this is uncharted territory. It’s not quite chemistry, not quite combat. It’s as if someone handed me a live grenade and asked me to critique its aesthetics.
He senses my panic and, graciously, changes the subject. “This place is something, huh?”
I glance around at the glittering crowd. “Ever feel like you’re just watching yourself at these things? Like you’re not really here?”
He studies me for a moment, his eyes catching the pool lights. “You seem pretty real to me.”
"And what exactly am I?” I ask the question slipping out before I can stop it.
He takes inventory—deliberately, a scan from my shoes to my hair and back. “Like someone who’s dying to get out of this dress and into pajamas.”
