“Then you know we have the right to record you at any time during the filming of the show, at our sole discretion. And Emily, as your assistant, signed the same waiver, so . . .”
He’s right. He has every right to record us, at any time, for any reason.There’s a clause that stipulates that they’re not allowed to air nudity, but that’s clearly not going to help me out here.
I swallow, trying to think of any way that I can get out of this.
I’m coming up with nothing.
“None of that was any of your business,” I say. “You’re an asshole if you air that.”
Rich gives me a grim smile. “Sorry, Jason. Everything that happens here is my business.”
I ball my fists. I want to punch him, and make him give me that recording, and promise not to use it. We’re not the fucking narrative.The Not-Wives are.
But it’s too late. I know it is. We signed the damn contracts, and while we expected that to just be a catch-all to cover their asses if they wanted to use footage with us in the background of the shot—
Now we’re going to be part of this, in ways we never wanted to be.
I could stand here and argue with Rich about it all night, but it won’t do any good. So I spin around and head back to the tent, where I’m going to have to break it to Emily that all our personal business is now going to be aired onTV.
Five
Emily
Jason takes the flashlight with him when he leaves the tent, and though I could very easily grab my own flashlight from my duffel bag, I’m too flooded with emotion to bother. So I sit in the dark, brushing away tears, feeling relieved and confused and unsettled, alternately and all at once.
If Jason’s right, and the problem isn’t that he doesn’t love me, what the hell can it be? I can’t imagine anything worse than what I’d thought, but—
There’s some scuffling noises, and I’m pretty sure I hear voices not far away, maybe at a nearby tent. One of them is Jason’s, but he must be whispering—well, whispering for Jason—and he sounds pissed.
I hear Rich’s return voice, low. Something about contracts and waivers, and as that unsettled feeling I already had focuses on something else entirely, it occurs to me to wonder why Rich isn’t in his own tent across the clearing or in one of the trailers.
Oh, shit, are they—
Jason practically tears apart the zipper coming back into the tent and then just as angrily zips it up behind him.The light from his flashlight bobs crazily with the motion.
“They were recording us,” he growls. “Those fuckers were recording us.”
My stomach plunges further, and I put my hands over my face. “Oh, god. Of course they are.” Because we were stupidly yelling in a tent, and then talking about all these dramatic relationship things, the perfect fodder for a reality show, even if it’s supposed to be about crazy rich divorcées and not about crazy significantly-less-rich hosts and producers.
There’s no way they’re not going to include this footage.
“I’m sorry, Em.” Jason sits and puts his arm around me.
I lean in to him, just wanting to curl into him like this forever. Except I’d rather it not be comfort about the fact that I’ve just become a very unwilling reality show star.
“It’s not your fault,” I say. “We were both yelling, and I should have just kept quiet until we weren’t surrounded bya reality show film crew.”This last part comes out as a groan.
“Hey, no.” Jason hugs me closer. “There was no way you should have suffered with that any longer. And I needed to hear it.”
That may be true, but I don’t think the rest of the world did.
Everyoneis going to know about our problems. What did we talk about? Jason’s family?Myfamily?
They didn’t get video, only audio, so they aren’t likely to use every word of that.They’re going to cut it down to the most juicy, interesting pieces. And they’re going to want more from us, to put the whole thing into context, so they can keep interweaving more and more pieces of what we’ve said with better footage.
“They’re not going to let this go, are they?” I say. “We’re going to be followed by cameras constantly, because they’ll be waiting for more drama.”
As much as I’d like to believe Jason and I can just play it cool for the rest of the week, there’s no way. We’re in the middle of something major and stressful—though what the hell is it? We’re not great actors at the best of times.
