SNIPPET

I used to daydream about this life. Years of my childhood were consumed by fantasies of glitz and glamour. Hell, I thought about fame so much I even romanticized the hangovers. I thought I had imagined everything, but I never imagined this: sucking Cheez-It crumbs off the neckline of a vintage John Galliano gown. A gown my publicist probably had to put a lien on her firstborn to get out of a museum and onto my body.

I wish I could go back in time and show myself this reality. Weren’t there supposed to be wild A-list afterparties? Not me, alone, bored out of my mind on a double bed in the first Holiday Inn to pop up on Google, watching reruns of a Disney Channel show I wasn’t even on.

I would give my left kidney for something as interesting as a hangover right about now.

The door to the adjoining suite opens and my manager, Elena, enters, her head of prematurely grey hair bent over her phone. When she finally looks up, her eyes scan the mess that is my bodice with total disinterest. Instead of commenting, she brandishes her phone at me. “Well, they aren’t saying you were off-theme.”

“Perfect,” I say, popping a cracker into my mouth. That should save me a few weeks of hate comments, something I learned the hard way after the disastrous ‘Mystery in Fashion’ themed year. I got death threats for being too ‘visible,’ whatever that means.

“No. They aren’t saying anything about you, Bianca. Nothing. Giovanni Manzini’s seeing eye dog is getting more coverage than you.”

I sigh, muting the TV in the middle of a laugh track. “To be fair, she’s a very good dog.”

“Sweetheart,” Elena snaps, drumming her nails against the lacquered dresser. “Your engagement is plum-met-ing. Have you gotten a chance to look at those socials I sent you?”

Languidly, I reach over and unlock my phone. Instagram is already open to the most recent photo on Patrick Celebrini’s profile— a “candid” of him at a New York Rangers game. My gaze traces the line of his strong jaw, his cocky grin. I like to think of men in the industry as existing along a Spiderman-to-Superman spectrum. Michael Cera would never play Superman. Dwayne Johnson would never play Spiderman. Patrick is a Superman. In every photo, he wears this half-smirk, staring down the camera like he’s either going to fight it or make out with it. His black hair is forever gelled into a sexy swoop, often adorned by designer brand-placement sunglasses. He treats every available inch of his body as advertising space. Very expensive advertising space.

Like me, Patrick was a child star. He came up on a variety of family-friendly sitcoms as the popular boy everyone had a crush on. I can only imagine how much life is packaged tightly inside him, only emerging behind closed doors. I know plenty of people who have “dated” him or been “spotted with” him to drum up a viral moment. From all accounts, he’s a PR dating dream: a sweet and sexy boyfriend for the cameras who wants nothing to do with you in private. And that’s the perfect arrangement for me, because I don’t really want anything to do with him either. It’s just another role to play. A commercial that lasts a couple months.

He’s a good candidate. Great, even. But something is telling me he’s just not the right choice.

I type in TheFayeCarmichael into the search.

There’s a green circle around her profile picture, and that gives me pause. I barely know Hollywood’s latest It Girl Overnight Sensation Perfect Blonde Princess, and she has me on her private story? Even more concerning—she has a private story. With her name right there in the top left corner for anyone to screenshot and sell to a deuxmoi-alike. It’s the kind of mistake the newly-famous keep making until they don’t, until they complain a little too loudly, until they’re faced with a media firestorm of their own making and they have to make a hard left into apology-tour territory.

The kind of territory where people are desperate enough to reach out to my publicist with all sorts of proposals… including marriage. Faye’s not quite there, but something is happening with her. Whatever it is hasn’t broken the surface just yet, but clearly her team is aware it’s coming.

“Did they tell you why Faye wants to do this?”

“They said they won’t tell us before we do an NDA,” Elena replies, scratching the side of her head as her other hand doomscrolls endlessly.

I click her story. It’s a photo of her in the gala’s bathroom mirror, with her dress designed to look like the bubbles of a bubble bath tastefully arranged into a gown that could dissolve any moment. The sans serif font that covers her eyes reads, ‘CAN YOU BELIEVE WE’RE HERE!! !!!! !”

Cute. She still thinks of her audience as a ‘we.’