13 Carve Out a Space for Yourself
Carve Out a Space for Yourself
Her stomach wobbled queasily with nerves. She fully vomited her breakfast of biscuits and fruit into the toilet, which was where Manny found her.
He spent a full hour doing her hair and makeup, then procured a gold dress patterned with hundreds of tiny hammers crossed in X’s, the symbol of the X-er System.
The dress had off-the-shoulder cuffs, a low-cut bodice, and an impressive slit up the thigh.
There was no way in ten non-existent hells Temmi was wearing it.
“That’s not from my new wardrobe.”
“Your new wardrobe was lacking.” Manny sniffed. “There will be cameras broadcasting your first step on the Prop. You’re wearing the dress.”
“Fuck, no.”
Manny placed his finger and thumb against his forehead in a please, someone help me gesture.
“The dress makes you look desirable, babe. You want a good first impression? Then wear it. In fact, you’re going to be wearing a lot of dresses over the coming weeks, no matter what the princess ordered for you. ”
Temmi crossed her arms. Another bout of vomit threatened to swim up her throat.
She couldn’t do this. She was going to turn herself into a laughingstock.
Strutting around in revealing clothing for other people’s entertainment went against every fiber of her being.
Two million credits , she reminded herself.
So long as Temmi remained here, wearing stupid dresses, Spie’s rich girl money would bleed over to her family.
In all honesty, maybe Spie Expani didn’t deserve the vitriol Temmi had been sending her way.
She had, after all, hired Temmi’s mom an in-home caretaker, and given her a medical fund, without being asked.
It was surprisingly generous of her. The thought resulted in a confusing squirmy sensation in Temmi’s gut, so she banished it. Vitriol seemed the safer way to go.
She grabbed the dress from Manny. “Just so we’re clear, I’m not happy about this.”
“I really don’t care, sweetie.” He waggled his fingers in her direction.
Temmi felt utterly naked in the dress. With it on, she had no way to safely wear her orrist basalt necklace, so she slipped it into her boot. When she emerged from the bathroom, it was to a slow clap from Manny.
He whistled low. “You are a treat. Some of my best work.”
Temmi flipped him off.
“Last thing.” He picked up a pair of strappy blue heels from the armchair behind him.
“No.” Temmi had never been more horrified in her life.
Two million credits wasn’t worth this. “Manny, no. I put the dress on, but I draw the line at heels. I can’t walk in them!
Blessing Stone didn’t train me for that; I’ll trip all over the place.
” She raised one leg, showing off her sleek black combat boots.
Probably her favorite addition to her new wardrobe.
“I actually think my boots here go really well with the dress’s gold. ”
Manny made a show of contemplating before heaving a dramatic sigh. “I never make concessions on beauty, but I’ll give you this one.” He dropped the heels back onto the armchair.
Temmi had never been more relieved in her life.
Kalvin showed up a few minutes later, wearing a crisp black suit. “The heirs have already been shuttled to the surface,” he said. “I’ll be traveling with you, Ambassador Ialan. Don’t worry about your things; they’ll be packed and brought to the manor. We’re leaving.”
“Now?” Temmi was nowhere near ready—emotionally speaking. “Couldn’t we orbit the planet a few more times? Maybe make a quick run to the Moons? I hear they’re only a few hours’ flight from here.”
“Off you go.” Manny pushed against her back.
Temmi dug her boots into the ship’s carpet. “I think I’m changing my mind. I can’t do this. I’m going to make a fool of myself. And Nix can do way better than me. I don’t know what I was thinking. I’m a fucking trash collector. That’s Expan out there. Expan .”
“I think she’s in shock,” Manny said.
Kalvin gingerly set down a tablet he was carrying, laying it next to the gods-awful heels Temmi had been saved from wearing.
“Ambassador Ialan,” he said in that calm, measured way of his.
He crossed the sitting room until he was standing directly before her, closer than an X-er would find comfortable.
“I can’t do it, Kalvin. You have to send me back. This isn’t me. I don’t belong here. I’m going to look like an idiot. I hate looking like an idiot.”
“Do you want to know something His Highness confided in me this morning?” Kalvin’s accent soothed her, reminded her she wasn’t the only expatriate there.
“What?” Temmi asked, breathless. Or maybe she was just having a panic attack. It really was hard to breathe. And was the room spinning? The ship had settled into orbit in the middle of the night, so it had to be her. She thought she might be sick again.
“He said he’s spent his entire life feeling misunderstood. Said he’s been terrified of the show, terrified he’d never get to experience real love. And though he’s still terrified, he says he’s also excited because he finally has something to look forward to.”
Temmi was on the verge of hyperventilating. Or was she already hyperventilating? Manny rubbed slow circles along her upper back. Under normal circumstances, the touch would appall her, but right now, she found it calming.
Kalvin put a long finger under her chin. Lifted it. His eyes were as dark as obsidian. They were kind eyes. Gentle eyes. Exhausted eyes. “You aren’t here for a dating show, Artemis. You aren’t here to become entertainment for the trillions of people out there watching.”
“Oh, thanks, really making me feel better.”
He removed his finger from under her chin.
“You’re here because I believe, regardless of your past, that you are exactly the person your planet needs.
You are exactly the person Nix Expani needs.
Who cares if you belong? Carve out a space for yourself.
It’s what I did. Do you think the Expanese cared about a kid from a tiny, war-plagued space station?
Do you think I’m here to produce reality holovision because I love the drama? ”
“I don’t know. People are weird.” Temmi’s breathing was beginning to come easier. “Maybe you love it.”
A rare twitch of Kalvin’s lips. The closest he ever came to smiling.
“This is my first season working on Love Galaxy . I serve as Her Excellency’s media consultant—I’ve produced her son and daughter since the day they were born.
Do you know what that means? I have the emperor’s ear.
Her children trust me. Because of my station’s proximity to the Uiyoni, we are never included in the lottery for Love Galaxy ; we’re not permitted official ambassadors, nor do we have representation in the Galactic Senate.
“But my position in the imperial court gives me a voice. Allows me to advocate for my people, my space station. Not in an official sense, but you’ll often find that most of the conversations that lead to change happen unofficially.
When you go on Love Galaxy , your presence will shine a spotlight on the X-er System, on X72.
Your home will become relevant Galactically.
While you are here talking with Prince Nix and Princess Spie, your people will have a voice in the highest echelons of the empire.
Your voice. And if you win? There’s no limit to the change you can enact for your people. ”
· · ·
As the transport’s hatch pounded shut, Temmi’s gut clenched.
The engine barked to life, slowly building to a deafening roar.
She slid a pair of earplugs out of the bodice of her dress and squished them into her ears.
Her two weeks on the starship had been a strange, liminal space between who she’d been and who she was going to have to become.
Cloaked in the vast emptiness of space, the absurdity of her new reality had felt distant and surreal, her early mornings with the prince like a suspended dream.
But now, as the transport’s holo flashed on, she was confronted with the breathtaking image of a massive planet, an endless curvature of green and blue and white.
Expan. X72, that putrid mass of dense silica, was light-years away.
The transport shot from the docking bay like a projectile loosed from a catapult.
Thrown back in her seat, Temmi closed her eyes, grabbed the armrests, and squeezed hard.
Her stomach roiled with nausea. Too soon, the transport would be absorbed into the blue-green expanse before them and Temmi would emerge as Ambassador Ialan, a woman carrying the hopes of an entire planet in the contraband orrist basalt necklace she kept tucked inside her left boot.
Cameras would violate her privacy, broadcasting her arrival to hundreds of territories.
Strangers would learn her name, would develop opinions of her, write articles and think pieces, form parasocial relationships with this version of her she wasn’t entirely sure was real, and forever after, a piece of her would belong to them . To the empire.
Temmi had never liked being the center of attention.
She abhorred feeling exposed. She was an X-er.
Exposure was vulnerability and vulnerability meant death.
A shiver of cold flashed through her chest. The cold of inevitability.
Because this wasn’t X72. This was Expan .
Colorful, vibrant, rich Expan. Here, exposure was the only thing that would keep her family housed.
“You remember your talking points?”
Temmi blinked and removed her right earplug.
She strained her neck sideways to find Kalvin assessing her.
His cool gaze, ageless and wise. She’d come on the show to lift her family from poverty, but how many millions of X-ers would be watching her with hope in their hearts?
Hope that she, Temmi Ialan, secondary-school dropout and convicted criminal, would make their lives better.
It was ridiculous, yes, but it was what Ollie would have felt about whoever should’ve been chosen in her stead.
Love Galaxy wasn’t just a dating show. It was the best political opportunity her planet might ever have.
But that isn’t who I am, who I want to be.
The orrist basalt in her boot seemed to heat up, practically burning her toes.
“Ambassador?” Kalvin pressed, voice softer, as though he was reading her mind or, rather, reading the plain apprehension on her face.
Temmi recited, monotonously, “My name is Ambassador Artemis Ialan of the industrious X System, Planet X72. I am honored and humbled to have been chosen as my planet’s representative on this season of Love Galaxy . Expan is more beautiful than I ever could’ve imagined.”
Blessing Stone had drilled the short speech into her, forcing Temmi to repeat it until she’d gone to sleep dreaming the words. But they felt hollow, the cracks between syllables going sticky with uncertainty. Or maybe fear.
“Drop the stale words.” Kalvin pressed a button on a silver panel beside his chair. The holo depicting Expan’s expanding surface disappeared, and with it a portion of Temmi’s anxiety. If she couldn’t see it, that meant it wasn’t real, right?
“You’re not an actress, Ambassador Ialan,” Kalvin said, his words seemingly louder, more tangible, without Expan’s enormity crowding the transport’s interior.
“Don’t try to act. You want to appear genuine in front of those cameras?
Then say something real. Not something Blessing Stone told you to say. ”
Temmi inhaled deeply. Exhaled slowly. The air wasn’t enough. She focused on the back of the silver hatch in front of her, listened to the hum and vibration of the transport descending, and swallowed against the plummet of her stomach as they hit freefall.