one
KIT
Nothing New – Taylor Swift, Phoebe Bridgers
Imiss bread.
Slumped in my makeup chair, the steel-boned corset of my dress threatened to squeeze the life out of me as my eyes devoured the festive food laid out by catering. Perfectly symmetrical carrot sticks. Dainty cucumber and cream cheese sandwiches with their crusts neatly trimmed. Holly jolly themed labels stabbed into lumps of cheese and dips: Yule Brie Mine, Sleigh My Name Cheddar, and Ho-Ho-Hummus peeked from the platters like private jokes. It all mocked me.
Seriously, what’s the point of an all-you-can-eat buffet at a photoshoot other than to torture the models?
But the anxiety of being wrangled back into this outfit with safety pins by the already overworked wardrobe assistants was enough to keep me from temptation.
One bite, and I’d risk exile for crimes against couture.
“Still waiting?” Sienna’s voice cut through my hunger-fuelled haze. She somehow managed to look effortlessly glamorous inonly a bikini top and a skirt that shimmered like silver fish scales.
Side by side, we looked like we’d been styled for completely different shoots: me, a wrapped Christmas present; her, a mermaid at a Las Vegas pool party.
“Looks like they’re almost ready.” I gestured vaguely at the chaos around us.
“Will I be seeing you at the afters?” Sienna dropped into the chair next to me. “I think they’ve hired out Isabelle’s. I’ve never been.”
I had to bite my tongue. I’d been a private member of Isabelle’s for years. During what the press called my ‘wild child’ era in my early twenties – which felt like a lifetime ago, but in reality hadn't even been a decade – the club had been my second home. Velvet booths, gold-leaf ceilings, and the kind of lighting that made every secret feel seductive. I knew every bartender by name, had my favourite booth in the back corner, and more than a few memories I wasn’t quite ready to revisit.
“I’m not sure,” I answered, a familiar heat curling in my chest, equal parts anger and resignation. The sparkle of industry parties had long since dulled. Years of being around men who get far too grabby after the second bottle is uncorked will do that.
“Oh, come on, it’s supposed to be amazing. Youpracticallyinvented the afterparty. Or have you retired the champagne-soaked chaos act?”
The word landed too sharply coming from her – bright-eyed and untouched by the kind of trouble that waits backstage, behind closed doors, after the lights go down.Retired.I knew it all too well, and maybe I had grown tired of it all. The glitz losing its glamour.
Stumbling out of clubs, blackout drunk, only to be met by the blinding flash of a pack of hungry photographers. Hungovermornings paired with black coffee and an upskirt photo from the night before splattered across the tabloids. Doing it all again to numb the sharp ache that kind of harassment left behind.
“No, I can’t make it,” I said firmly. “I have plans.”
Sienna moved on, rattling off all the parties she was hoping to make it to, all attended by names I had known for years, a mix of old friends and famous faces. Behind her, the set was a circus of missed deadlines and frayed tempers. The gaffer adjusted the lights for the fifteenth time; someone else re-draped a backdrop. All to satisfy the photographer, Pierre Alexander.
He’d been stomping around all morning, alternating between throwing tantrums and muttering to himself. There was minimal editorial presence from the magazine on set after a flu had wiped out half the staff. And with hours to spare, Pierre had taken it upon himself to change the artistic direction entirely.
And yet, somehow, it was always the models who were blamed for being difficult.
“It’s been ages,” Sienna said. “How much longer do you think they’ll take?”
I almost laughed. She had no idea. Six months into her meteoric rise and Sienna was still new to the scene, her world an endless parade of first-class flights and front-page features.
I’d been doing this since I was fifteen, excluding one quiet season I spent in Zürich, and most of the girls I started with were long gone. For the few who hadn’t found Prince Charming, offers dried up the moment they turned thirty,
Little did Sienna know this glamour had an expiration date.
“Hard to say.” I studied Pierre, who was jittering his way around the set, barking orders while darting towards the bathroom. “Judging by his vibe, I’d give him five minutes to bump a couple of lines. Then he’ll be good to go.”
Sienna followed my gaze, then smirked. “Think he’ll share?”
I raised a brow. “Didn’t you get fired from a job last week for that?”
We weren’t particularly close – she was barely eighteen to my twenty-nine – but I’d had some friends working that shoot, and they’d dished out the gossip over vodka martinis and a shared bowl of olives.
“Didn’t stop me from booking this job.”
