Ruby (Deliverance: Alien Hunting Grounds #6)

Chapter 1

Ani

The moan starts low, deep in my stomach, the resonance building just like the many crescendos I’ve sung. It’s the perfect counterpoint to the slap of flesh against flesh.

The feel of his hip bones against me is an anchor to the moment.

A long breath puffs against my neck, a shiver rising as it stirs the small hairs. It distracts me from the muted feel of his hands on my breasts and I almost miss my cue, arching my back and bringing my moan higher just that small beat too late.

And suddenly it’s all out of balance. I’m no longer her, instead lost in that liminal space between versions of myself. Lost because there is no foundation.

Luckily, there’s a hum in the room that never stops to call me back. The quiet roar of lights, the shuffle of shoes, the faint whine of a lens refocusing. It’s supposed to disappear when the cameras roll, but I hear everything.

I always do.

The moment before my fatal error I try to catch myself, but I’m still partly in the space between. I stiffen when I see where my gaze has fallen. Right into the lens.

“Fuck, Ani. This isn’t fucking porn,” the director sneers.

Someone in the back of the room snickers, bright lights making them anonymous. Not that they wouldn’t do the same right to my face.

For a moment I don’t know what expression is on my face, then I shake myself, pulling up my most common mask.

The Bitch.

“Maybe if you didn’t cast a limp dick mouth breather I’d have more to work with,” I shoot back.

Mouth Breather stiffens, but in all the wrong places, then pulls away. I wince as the movement shifts the adhesive of my thong, tugging against my sensitive skin.

“I’m not into grannies,” he replies, pulling a snort from me. He might be a better actor than I’ll ever admit, but clearly he’s not great at insults.

“Shut the fuck up and get it right,” the director growls out in his best barking voice.

Mouth Breather and I take a deep breath and reset.

My moves are mechanical as I dress, ignoring the hovering people working on my hair and makeup.

I roll my eyes when I see him put on his platform shoes, annoyed at the vanity of yet another man trying to match my height, then make myself ignore anything but who I am supposed to be at this moment. Her, not me.

The script calls for a “moment of electric chemistry.” Choreography and art. A tilt of the chin, a pause on the breath, the illusion that what I’m about to do isn’t separated from my soul by a thin layer of professionalism and peppermint.

Across from me, he’s doing the same thing. Pretending not to hear the crew whispering. Someone snorts. Someone makes a low whoop, trying to stifle it like we’re a joke, not two people trying to make something believable.

We both ignore it. That’s the skill no one teaches. How to stay open while the world intrudes.

“Action.”

The word slices through the set, and I turn toward him. The lights wash the edges off everything, even my nerves. In that heartbeat, I’m not me. I’m her. Someone brave enough to mean every touch. I press forward.

His hand finds the small of my back, steady, practiced. My mouth meets his, soft and certain, as if we aren’t surrounded by lights and lenses and laughter waiting to happen. There’s a kind of quiet there, a stillness that belongs only to us.

Then he undresses me hungerly, and this time I maintain my hold on her, lust racing along my nerves in response as my moans rise again.

The scene ends. The rhythmic sound of skin against skin dies. Someone claps, mockingly. Someone mutters about food.

I shift out from underneath him and nod like it’s nothing, no different from reading a line or hitting a mark.

But I can still feel the breath caught between us, that flicker of something human.

That fragile, unfilmed, and real something that existed for the smallest moment before everyone remembered we were acting.

I retreat to my chair in the corner, the one with my name stenciled on tape that’s started to peel.

I notice the new name printed a few seats down.

A younger woman, same hair color as mine, though hers comes from liberal application of bleach, same polite laugh I used to have, same way of thanking every assistant who doesn’t look her in the eye.

I used to wear that mask, but it was poor protection and it took me far too long to realize it had nothing to do with success. That came down to the fickle nature of fame, and of course opening my legs.

Should I tell her?

I snort again, this time at my stupidity.

She already knows, or she should. Everyone should know the price of fame. I rake her over with a critical eye, noting the work she’s had done.

It won’t help.

“She was beautiful,” they will say, if they aren’t already commenting on it. Was.

Funny how this industry tries to convince you that you’re immortal, and then reminds you, frame by frame, that you’re not. Every close-up becomes a measurement of decay.

When I first shifted to more adult roles, older actors told me not to chase the approval, not to mistake applause for love. I thought they were just bitter. Now I understand.

It’s not bitterness, it’s grief.

The kind that doesn’t wail, doesn’t announce itself. It just settles in your chest, heavy and permanent, like dust the lights can’t quite catch.

“Ready to go again?” a PA asks.

She’s smiling the way people do when they want something from you. Polite, hopeful, already half somewhere else, that small wince in the corner of her mouth directly results from dealing with the Bitch.

I nod, let myself be readjusted, and step back into the light. The makeup artist smooths a wrinkle at the corner of my eye with practiced care, and I pretend not to notice. Everyone pretends. That’s the currency of this place.

We roll again. The same embrace. The same fake tenderness and hunger. Only now I linger a fraction longer in that tiny, fleeting quiet. In that place where I am her, and there is no other mask. The one place without judgment or camera angles.

“Cut,” the director says. Applause, laughter, chatter. Noise again.

I smile. That’s what they expect. But inside, I’m whispering something only for myself.

I’m still here. I’m still me.

As always, I ignore the part of my mind hung up on the obvious. Who the fuck am I?

***

“I’ve seen you play kind roles,” my therapist says in that carefully neutral voice of hers. “Very convincingly, I might add.”

A snort escapes before I can think better of it. “You mean the roles that had tomatoes thrown at me?”

That pulls a small sigh, and it feels like a win, at least until she continues talking. “We aren’t talking about fame right now, Ani, but identity.”

I show her my best scowl, though it has lost some of its impact thanks to my forehead no longer moving. “I’m the Bitch. I know my identity.”

“Truly?” she lobs back, one eyebrow raised. “Or is that a defense mechanism in a predatory system?”

“Predator is always better than prey,” I scoff.

Now her smile is back and I know she led me right where she wanted me.

“It isn’t a dichotomy of choices. There is a spectrum of predator—or ‘the Bitch’ as you like to call that side of you—and being prey that you are ignoring.

Plus, we have already established that ‘the Bitch’ isn’t your true identity.

We need to find out what that is if you want to progress. ”

“I know,” I concede.

Now it’s my turn to sigh. “But the ship sailed on me knowing who I am the moment I made her goals my goals.”

“I know your mother is a powerful force in your life, but give yourself some grace. You are allowed to forgive yourself for being young, you know. And as an adult you can make different choices.”

I roll my eyes. She’s said all of this before. “Look, I know this is your specialty and yada, yada…”

I trail off because I’m not really sure what my point is.

“Come now, Ani. How many child stars did you start with who are dead now? Or walking the line with drugs? I understand why you became ‘the Bitch,’ but the utility of that role has passed.”

My skin prickles when their faces drift into my memory. “Don’t I pay you to make me feel better? Not depress me?”

“We both know you don’t want coddling,” she tells me with a slight frown. “You want truth.”

I look up, trying to gather my thoughts. She has me on that point. Honesty really is a rare element, especially in my world.

“We have five minutes left. Anything else on your mind?”

So many things. None of them something that could be discussed in that amount of time.

“What would you suggest?” I ask her.

Her lips quirk up. It’s her tell for when she’s about to say something I won’t like.

“How about you try what I mentioned last month? Sharing some of your struggles with someone besides me. Voicing your opinion and feelings.”

“I tried it the last time you brought it up,” I remind her.

“Right. With the finance guy. Tate?”

“No, the one before him,” I correct. “He was in tech.”

“Ah, right,” she says, her tone holding none of the judgment I usually detect regarding my dating habits.

It’s why she’s still my therapist.

“From what I remember you made a painful memory into a joke and then ended up breaking up with him the day after because he brought it up at a party.”

“Yes, exactly.”

I let out a huff, remembering how annoyed I was. It was already plastered across the internet by the time I got home.

“I’ve tried,” I remind her. “It’s a risk sharing anything.”

“I know it is, Ani, but you’re going to need to find someone else in your life you can open up to. Bottled emotions are—”

“I know, I know.”

I’d rather not have her late for her next session explaining that to me for the fifteenth time.

It’s easy for her to say. She isn’t under a microscope with people waiting to post about her “PMS episodes” if she squints the wrong way into the sun.

“The Bitch isn’t the role that leads to happiness, Ani. You can’t wear a mask and have a real relationship. Just try again,” she urges.

I let out a long sigh. “I will.”

“Good,” she chirps. “Talk to you next week.”

I give her a little wave. I’ve long since trained myself to never smile unless I must.

Laugh lines only look good on men, not to mention those muscles don’t really work all that well anymore.

It’s suddenly too quiet. Without her soothing voice echoing through it, my condo feels cold and empty again. I don’t have any casting calls today and I doubt I’ll see Shane before midnight.

I hear a ping on my phone and try to resist looking.

According to my therapist, I’m supposed to be spending this time letting my mind wander so I can make connections and plans for my future. The latter feels just as bleak as always and so it takes very little convincing to pick up my phone.

I try to avoid looking at the comments under the post I made earlier today. I fail, as usual.

As I scroll through, obsessively moving through until the end, my stomach feels tighter and tighter. Most of the negative comments are about my body, of course. Then my terrible acting skills.

And of course that I’m a whore.

It’s intermixed with the usual offers of marriage, professions of undying love, stalker-style comments, and altered images and movies that make me look idiotic.

Another comment pops up, this time expounding on how I don’t deserve Shane and I’m only using him to increase my platform.

That one makes me laugh.

He has a small fraction of my base and all I’ve gained from him are comments like that one. Meanwhile, his following has tripled since I started dating him last week.

I never respond to comments. I wish I could make myself ignore them completely.

I’m interrupted from thinking of ways to manage this stupid addiction by a call from the Witch. I briefly consider ignoring her, but it isn’t worth the hassle.

“Hello, Mother.”

“Have you heard back?” she asks me, her voice harsh after her many years of smoking.

“No.”

She snorts. “I know someone. I’ll get you set up to go on a date.”

My heart sinks. “I don’t want to—”

“You will go, Anichka.”

“Whatever. Fine,” I say, annoyed.

“You aren’t scowling right now are you? I can hear it in your voice,” she accuses.

“You know my face doesn’t move that way anymore, Mother. You insisted I looked old in the last film. So I turned into stone. Remember?”

“Don’t talk back to me, straya korova,” she hisses.

I take in a slow breath to keep myself from hanging up. It would only make it worse. I used to be an “ungrateful cow.” When did her standby pot shot become “old cow”?

I swallow down the sting of the new insult, along with any words I might say back.

“Did you read the article about that new procedure?” she asks, tone back to neutral like nothing just happened.

“Yes,” I tell her, tone clipped.

I didn’t.

I try to think of ways to reroute her and think back to my promise to be more open with my feelings. Dread tightens my throat and my stomach aches at the idea of telling her I don’t want to do something. Maybe I can just share about the past instead.

“Do you remember when I was thirteen,” I say. “That first director?”

“We are not talking about this again, Anichka. No one gets to the top by looking backward.”

I open my mouth to respond, but no one is on the other side of the call.

Only one person in this relationship can exit a conversation like that without repercussions. It sure as hell isn’t me.

I don’t know how she can still be deluded that I’ll ever reach the top. I’m mid-list, at best.

I spend an hour reading the article she sent and researching, then looking up more reliable sources. According to several respectable journals, it’s a terrible idea. There’s a long list of side-effects, some of them pretty horrific.

It won’t change anything so I toss my phone onto the table next to my cold coffee and curl up on the couch. She always finds a way to get what she wants. By whatever means necessary, regardless of fallout, emotional or otherwise.

I don’t want to think about it, so instead I take a valium, trying not to think about what my therapist would say about me taking it, and close my eyes.

My lungs pull in one long breath after another as I will my drug of choice to calm the stampede of horses running in all different directions.

Or the mental loops of all the stupid things I have said.