5. Octavia
Chapter 5
Octavia
F ighting things is exhausting.
When you watch television shows like Avatar: The Last Airbender as a kid , small children can master powers to fight against the injustices of their world. It always got me all jazzed up to do the same. When I was older, I planned to do the very same.
But given enough time, the unsteady roads wear down tire treads.
With enough sand, the hardest of rocks are polished smooth.
And after enough snide comments, even the fieriest hearts burn out.
Sometimes all I want is one day without needing to fight. I just want to walk out into the world and be small enough, normal enough, and average enough that the world doesn’t notice me.
I do appreciate the people who are raring to fight for me.
It just never changes anything, and I’ve been worn down over the years until I realize that the one being battered the most forcefully by all the lessons taught is always me. Nothing makes a noticeable difference, and I can’t fight things forever. The world will go on being exactly as it has ever been, so what I really need is to find a way to make a place for myself, a place that isn’t all sharp edges and bared teeth.
Jake means well.
Bea means well.
Whoever posted that video means well, too, I’m sure.
It’s just not a defense I want or need.
I know exactly how I look, and I’m acutely aware of how it impacts my future and my present. I’ve lived it for years, now.
“Are you ready? The studio wants you and Jake there soon, and today it’s recording, no blocking. You can’t be late.” Bea’s tapping her foot again. I swear, the woman hardly puts on any makeup at all, so she’s ready in three minutes.
“Not all of us have the face of a porcelain doll,” I say. “I’ll be ready in five more minutes.”
“You look great now,” Bea says, “but I wasn’t actually trying to rush you. Just checking in.”
“I’m just doing one more coat of mascara, and then?—”
Bea drops her hands on the small tabletop. “Hold up. I was serious that I wasn’t rushing you, but this is nuts. Are you actually nervous right now?”
My hand jerks and I spread mascara across my whole eyelid. I suppress my frustration and exhale. “I am, yes.”
“You’ve been a performer your whole life,” she says. “And you’re finally getting the chance to do it again, on a massive scale. Isn’t it kind of a dream-come-true?”
I’m wiping off my entire eye’s worth of makeup, but that doesn’t stop me from laughing. “I did perform as a child, but this has never been my dream.”
Bea drags a chair next to me. “Are you serious? I thought you were Eliza in My Fair Lady as a kid.”
“So. . .about that. I actually didn’t even audition.”
“You have to tell me about this. I totally thought you were obsessed with acting as a child.”
I shake my head. “I’ve always loved singing. I could sing all day and all night and be happy. I should’ve been born as a nightingale.” I can’t help my smirk. I pause to redo my eyeliner. “But my mother has always wanted to be an actor.” I frown. “She is an actress.”
“Okay.” Bea bobs her head. “And?”
“After having me, she couldn’t really afford a babysitter—she didn’t have any roles that paid yet. So she would take me with her to auditions, and when she got parts, she’d haul me to the practices too.”
“A baby?”
“Luckily I was a happy baby.” I shrugged. “And as I grew, I went as a toddler. I basically grew up on the sets of plays, commercials—you name it.”
“And?”
“Well, as I got older, I would watch what they did, and I listened, and I learned. So when Mom went to audition for My Fair Lady, she heard the cast was mostly going to be children, but she was desperate. The director of the local production was taking a sabbatical to spend more time with her child she had ignored, and she was heading back to Broadway after doing this one local production. Mom was sure if she could just be discovered by the woman, she’d finally get her role—the one she deserved. She’d break out.”
“Wasn’t it a production for the children?”
“It was, but a few characters were going to be played by adults, and one of those was Mrs. Higgins, the professor’s mother.”
“Okay, but your mom didn’t break out.”
“Right as her individual audition ended, someone called the applicants over to learn some moves for the racetrack scene. I overheard the director talking to the assistant, and they said she was terrible, and wouldn’t be a good fit for Mrs. Higgins.”
“That’s a lot for a kid to deal with.” Bea frowns. “But how did you wind up?—”
“I argued with them. I told them that Mom could change whatever they wanted, if only they gave her some notes. I told them they were wrong about her, and that she just needed a chance.” I wince.
“And?”
“I guess I reminded them of Eliza, popping off about injustice. They asked me to read a few scenes and we’d keep talking about how my mother would make a great Mrs. Higgins.”
“But really they wanted you.”
I shrug. “Then they asked me if I could show them how my mom would sing a few songs. I told them she was a way better singer than I was, but I did it.” I grimace. “You can see where this is going. They ended up picking me for Eliza even though I hadn’t auditioned. Mom. . .she?—”
“Oh, I bet your mom was giddy.” Bea’s eyes are dancing. “Even if she didn’t get the part, she could live vicariously through you.”
“Not exactly.” I can still see Mom’s eyes flashing, her lips thin and tight. “She was. . .unenthusiastic. She tried to talk the director into finding someone else, but I insisted on taking the role.”
The furrowed brow is back. “But if you didn’t want to do it--”
“I’d made a deal with the director,” I say. “I told him that I’d take the role, but only if he cast my mother as Mrs. Higgins.” I shrugged. “I couldn’t exactly tell Mom that I’d bargained for the first decent role she’d been offered in years. She’d have been. . .disappointed. So I kept my mouth shut and gritted my teeth and prepared to act my little heart out.”
“You’d never done a play before that?”
“I did a few plays at school,” I say, “but they upset my mom, so I avoided them after that. Mostly I did choir. Singing’s my thing, not acting.”
“When you sing you get up on stage and act some, so just channel that and today should be a breeze,” she says. “When you get nervous, remind yourself that you’re just singing.”
I roll my eyes. “While a million cameras record my face, my body, and my interactions with Jake.”
Bea smirks. “Better you than me.”
“Gee, thanks,” I say.
“But seriously,” Bea says. “You really do have a face, a body, and a voice for film. You look amazing .” She points at my eye. “You should probably redo the mascara though. Right now you look a little like Twiggy on that side, by comparison.”
She’s probably referencing some old movie or something—I swear, Bea would fit right in if she had been born in the early nineteen hundreds. I have been slowly trying to watch a few of the old movies she loves with her at night, because she makes a lot of references I just don’t get. I’ve learned it’s better not to let on that I have no idea what she’s talking about, or I’m in for an hour-long recap.
As we’re traveling to the set, this time to actually record, I can’t help my knee from bouncing.
Bea drops a hand on it. “As someone who acutely understands your reticence to do this,” she says, “let me just say. . .let Jake do the hard parts. When you get stressed out, just look my way, smile, and sing.”
“Is that what you do? You just sing and smile?” I arch an eyebrow. “Because you and Jake aren’t related, you know. You could be in the video.”
“I could if I sounded like you—but think about the PR they can get from this, once people hear your voice and see you together? You’re already trending.”
“Me and Jake?” I roll my eyes. “Please.”
“Please, what?”
“The world’s prettiest man and the world’s ugliest woman?”
Bea slaps her hand against the glass in the cab. “You aren’t ugly. Stop saying that. I forbid you to say it ever again.”
The cab stops. I yank the door handle and climb out. “Just because I’m not saying something doesn’t mean it’s not true.”
Before she has a chance to argue with me, I trot toward the entrance and check in with hair and makeup. They insist on touching things up, always, but they don’t make many changes, thankfully. After more than ten years of doing my makeup, I’ve gotten pretty good at it. All the makeup tutorials in the world don’t really make you an expert on balancing the skin of a severe burn with regular skin—life experience and two different colors of foundation help, though.
We all become experts at things when they become necessary.
Usually not a moment sooner.
“Your hair is just breathtaking,” the woman—Cecilia, I think?—gushes again. “I swear, I can’t believe you don’t get it colored. People kill for this rich, mahogany color.”
“Thanks.” Though I’m not so delusional that I think it’s different than just plain old brown.
Well-intentioned people go one of two ways when they meet me. They become super complimentary of everything, or they avoid talking about my appearance entirely. I’m not sure which is more awkward, but I know the people who are paying me loads of compliments are really trying, and that means something.
“Octavia?” Eddy’s standing in the doorway. “They’re ready for you.”
Now if only I was ready for them.
“Right.” I stand and brush the nonexistent lint off my pants. “I did want to clarify.” I gesture at my outfit. “Do I really need to be wearing all white, basically?” The white slacks feel like butter, and the white blouse is silky and gorgeous, but it’s strange. “Am I some kind of sacrifice for a dragon?”
Eddy’s lip twitches. “Not as far as I know.”
“Because I’d rather go in prepared if I am. At least give me a knife to hide behind my back.”
“It’s because you’re light and he’s dark. You’re the beauty and he’s the monster.” A woman steps out from behind Eddy. “I’m Jane Wellford, and you, my dear, need no introduction.”
“I do have a uniquely recognizable visage,” I say.
The woman has a dark brown, perfectly coiffed bob. A smile plays with the corners of her mouth just before she says, “It’s not your visage that interests me, though it seems to have created quite the furor online.”
“No?”
“It’s your voice. The second I heard it, I greenlit the request to use two nobodies for the soundtrack. If you knew who else we were considering, you’d know what it meant that I chose you. Now that you have the chance, I want you to take it. Go out there and be light and beauty.” She lifts her chin a hair. “Got it?”
Her strange sort-of pep talk actually helps. I can’t tell whether she’s a fan or a hater, but either way, the intense way she’s studying me is invigorating. I square my shoulders and walk past Eddy and Jane and toward the area marked as set eighteen. Before doubts can sneak back in, I push through the door. Standing in the center of the set, surrounded by at least five or six different women, is Jake Priest. He looks like he’s a king holding court or something.
Golden hair falls just so across his brow, shining under the stage lights. His brilliant, large blue eyes, dimples, and broad shoulders are visible even when occluded by the gaggle of flirting women.
“She’ll be here any minute, and I need to be—” As if something alerted him to my presence, he turns, his eyes meeting mine. When he smiles, it’s like a light was flipped on. The room brightens.
It’s outrageous that people online are linking us romantically. There couldn’t be a more mismatched pair than Jake and me, so I need to focus and get these music videos out of the way before the crazy ideas make me unhappy with my real life.
“Ready to get started?” Jake actually looks. . .excited? Which I do not understand at all.
“Sure,” I say, only now noticing that he’s wearing all black to my white. “This—” I gesture between our outfits. “It’s funny.”
“Is it?” He quirks a brow. “I kind of like it.”
The girls are whispering, and I wonder what they’re doing here until I realize they’re all in grey. They’re our backup singers. Of course they are. Six perfect faces, all of them here to help us stand out.
“This set.” Jane steps past me into the smallish room and waves. “We decided to mirror the meet cute scene of the movie.”
“Meet cute?” Jake arches one eyebrow. “I’m not sure you can call a courtroom cute, and I’m not sure you can really say that anything about their first meeting is cute.”
“That’s what I like about it. They’re diametrically opposed from the start. So in the movie, when they meet, grabbing disgusting courtroom coffee from the cart outside, they have no idea they’re on opposite sides. It’s not until Helene carries the coffee into the same courtroom. . .and hands it to her father that Tom realizes. . .she’s here with the prosecution.”
“So the courtroom. . .” I glance around. “And the coffee?”
“Everything in a courtroom is black and white,” Jane says. “So we’re doing the shots in black and white, except for the two of you, and you’re dressed in black and white too. That means your faces will really stand out.” She beams. “I think it’s brilliant. We might do the same thing for the introductory scene.”
“Might?” I ask. “Haven’t you filmed it yet?”
Jane shakes her head. “Time passes between the?—”
“Her hair’s shorter, so we’re doing the opening scenes last,” Eddy says. “Now, let’s get to the places we blocked.”
Yesterday, the set was still being built. I wasn’t sure quite what it was. Our blocking had more to do with where we stood and how we’d be angled when we sang our lines. Today, in costume, with benches and a podium. . .it feels a lot more real.
When everyone vacates and the lights click on, I know what’s going to happen. I’m prepared for the whirring of the fan, and the introductory music. I even remember the modifications we made to the song for the movie soundtrack.
But having Jake staring right at me, like he’s fascinated with me, like he can’t look away. . .it’s. . .he’s clearly a very gifted actor. It feels real. I remind myself that literally no one has ever looked at me that way, not in my entire life.
But I miss my cue, and then lots of people are looking at me.
“Okay, let’s do that again—did you hear it?” Eddy asks. “Do we need to get you headphones or turn up the sound?”
“I heard—” my voice cracks and I want to die. I cough to clear my throat. “I did hear it. Sorry.”
“It’s a lot,” Eddy says. “Let’s take it again.”
This time, Jake’s still staring at me, but I’m listening, and I come in right on time.
The world is full of beauty.
The world is full of peace.
Jake reaches up and tucks my hair behind my ear on the right side of my face. He bites his lip as he smiles at me, and then he picks up perfectly when it’s his turn.
The world is full of light and joy,
That almost never cease.
When I take over again, he drops his hand on my hand, his fingers encircling my wrist. It’s warm, and it’s strong, and if my voice wobbles a little as I sing the next lines, well, at least they’re replacing this sound with one from the studio.
You made me lots of promises.
You made them all come true.
We sing the last lines together, our voices blending much better than I anticipated.
I can hardly imagine living in
A world devoid of you.
I’d never thought of this as a love song, not until this moment.
During the musical segue, the backup singers spring out from a side door. It’s a little corny, or at least, it feels that way right now, but maybe they have some kind of plan for editing them that’s less dumb than the six of them dancing around us like wannabe gremlins in grey monochrome outfits. Jake does, right on cue, release my hand and walk away, but it’s his eyes that get me. He furrows his brow, and for all the world, it looks like walking away from me is killing him.
As I sing the opening lines, the backup singers are essentially just humming a harmony. I wonder why they didn’t just call them dancers.
The world is dark and terrifying.
All your promises were lies.
The ones who talked of beauty,
Were the first to avert their eyes.
I get it now, a little, why they included them. Jake has turned away, and he’s standing at the edge of the screen, and the women have sort of bunched around him, like they’ve all turned their backs on me.
The face you said was gorgeous,
You now cringe and turn away.
This wasn’t part of the blocking, but I turn to face the camera with my left side, my burned side.
The world has made it ugly,
Your gorgeous monstrosity.
I can barely see past the bright lights, but even with that limiting my vision, I can see the cringey looks on a few faces—the closest cameraman, for one. I channel my feelings about that, about all the people who cringe when they see me, about the people who are supposed to love me the most, but turned their faces away in disgust. That always makes it easy to keep from crying and instead hit my cue.
Anger trumps vulnerability every time.
You told me I was gorgeous.
You told me I was beloved.
You said you would be faithful.
No matter what the world did.
All the joy inside me,
My hope for a brighter day,
The monster consumed it all,
And I became beast and also prey.
This wasn’t in the blocking, but Jake turns back my way. He walks away from the women in grey beside him, and he holds his hand out toward me. When I come in again, he joins me.
The world is dark and terrifying.
That much, at least, was true.
But those who spoke of beauty
Were the villains, not me and you.
It’s not my face at fault here
It’s those who glare and jeer
The real beast lives inside of them,
They get back what they give.
I’m not sure why he did it. Maybe it was their plan all along. Maybe he meant to surprise me by providing support before the song called for it. Either way, it works. Tears well up in my eyes and spill over, streaming down my face. I choke them back though, and when the final rise comes, I’m ready for it.
Again, Jake sings a harmonizing line, just below mine. And as we first start, singing the lines, Stop looking to slay monsters,
And start working on yourself, he slides his hand over mine, lacing our fingers together.
My voice hitches a little, but I keep singing.
The gorgeous monstrosity you should fear
Is the one you see in the mirror.
Work on the creature only you can tame,
And when you see the ugliness,
Call it by name, oh, call it out by name.
Total silence follows the close of the music.
“I didn’t really understand,” I hear the camera guy saying. “I didn’t, but now I do.”
If we reach anyone else, anyone at all, maybe this was all worth it.
“What didn’t you understand?” Jake asks.
The camera guy coughs. “No, I just meant that with her voice, I mean, I’ve never heard anything like it. It just doesn’t match. . .” He cringes.
A muscle in Jake’s jaw pops, and he opens his mouth.
Before he can say anything, I drop a hand on his forearm. “It’s fine. Please let it go.”
Jake’s head whips toward mine.
“It’s in the song,” I whisper. “They have to realize what they’re saying and thinking themselves, or it won’t change anything.”
“But, I have to say,” a small voice off to the left says, “White Knight looks good on you. Are you sure you’re not the one who leaked the video?” Bea steps to the side, her smirk front and center on her face.
“Do you really think I’d have done that?” He glances my way. It’s the first time I realize that he does get some things—he wouldn’t have released a video that let everyone see me being mocked, even if it would have shifted the public image in a way that helped me.
“I guess you’re right.” She’s frowning, though. “It’s someone who wanted to help, but didn’t really get it.”
We redo the whole thing another five or six times, but in the end, I’m pretty sure the studio’s going to use the first one, where I was crying.
“I think we can call it a day,” Eddy finally says, spinning his hand, index finger out, round and round. “That’s a wrap.”
“That went fast,” Jake says. “Right?”
“It helps that the singer you found never misses a single note.” Eddy’s half-smile is encouraging. “I couldn’t believe how in sync the two of you were. It felt like you’d performed together a dozen times.”
“Instead of the truth—that they barely know one another.” Patrice is leaning against the wall. I hadn’t even realized she stayed. I hate the thought of her seeing me performing at all, much less such a vulnerable song. Maybe her mean words bothered me more than I realized. Even after all these years, some barbs still slip through my armor.
“Oh, I don’t know. I think I know Octavia pretty well.” Jake wraps an arm around my shoulder.
Patrice frowns. “She’s your sister’s friend, and I heard Bea say they only met a few months ago.”
“In addition to being my sister, Bea’s my roommate and my best friend,” Jake says. “As usual, you’re totally wrong about all your assumptions.”
“I’m totally wrong about which ones, exactly?” Patrice steps closer. “Because it seems like a mistimed comment on my part is causing all sorts of problems. It might even put the movie’s success in jeopardy, and instead of shoring things up for the movie, you’re over here. . .whatever it is you’re doing.” She waves her hand. “You backed the wrong person.”
Jake’s arm tightens around my shoulders. “I backed Octavia because. . .”
It was the right thing to do.
He’s a good guy.
He couldn’t support Patrice when she’s a jerk.
I’m not sure exactly what he’s going to say, but I can almost hear his voice already, defending me in the same way Bea always has. She’s fierce, like a tiger. She’s strong, like a hurricane. And she’s determined, like a donkey.
“It’s fine,” Patrice says. “This will all blow over and you won’t have to do stuff like this with her anymore. By the time the movie comes out, everyone will have forgotten about all the nastiness, and they may even re-record this whole thing. You don’t have to worry about your image or being linked to her.”
Is that what Jake was worried about? Is that why he hesitated?
Jake slips his fingers in between mine and tightens his hand around mine. “Oh, that’s not at all what worries me. Octavia hates being in the limelight, so I’ve done as she asked until now, but I’m done with it.” He steps closer to Patrice, dragging me along.
What’s he saying?
“Octavia Rothschild’s the most talented singer I’ve ever met, ever heard , and we just started dating. The only reason I’ve bitten my tongue until now is that she doesn’t like to make a scene.”
Gasps from all over the room confirm that I heard him right.
Dating.
Jake Priest just lied and said we’re dating.
That’s how he’s defending me against Patrice being an idiot? By making up some lie about how we’re dating? What good will that do? Who would ever believe it?
Right on cue, Patrice starts laughing. “Her? You want people to believe you’re dating her ?” She scoffs. “So I came in for a fake apology, and you go straight to fake dating.” She shakes her head.
Jake’s hand tightens again, but this time, instead of saying anything, he turns toward me. The look on his face is thunderous. His eyes are flashing, and his hand’s holding mine tightly when his mouth moves toward mine, slowly.
His eyes search mine, softening a bit.
“Sorry, Octavia,” he whispers.
And then he kisses me.