12. 12
The Bella Amore villa sat atop four acres of rocky coastline. The property actually had two houses: the main villa the cast lived in and a second, smaller house production had taken over for their own operations.
When I got out of the van, Harry either sensed my bubbling anxiety or simply had time to kill before I was needed in wardrobe.
Either way, I was all too happy to oblige when he suggested a tour of the property.
A production golf cart magically appeared, and we were off, driving down a footpath and snaking around the grounds.
We came to a stop at the edge of the cliff the villa was situated on. Down below, nestled between the curve of the coastline, was a private, white-sand beach.
“Don’t count on going down there much. It’s a pain in the arse to get equipment down and back up, so they try to avoid planning beach shoots unless it’s something major like a dumping,” Harry explained as we stood on the edge of the cliff and looked down.
The beach below looked like something out of a dream: untouched and idyllic.
I would have loved to spend most of my time down there.
We climbed back into the golf cart, and Harry took me to the production house.
“We call it the ‘Hut’ for short,” he told me as he propped open a door so I could peer inside.
It was a madhouse with producers and PAs flitting about.
Laptops covered almost every available surface.
A small table against one wall was stacked with pizza boxes and cases of water.
A walkie-talkie charging station had been set up next to it, filled with batteries and manned by a very focused PA making sure everything was charging correctly.
In the middle of the chaos was a massive wall of televisions. There had to have been about thirty small TVs mounted to the back wall of the space, displaying every live feed from inside the villa, each once capturing a different room and space and angle.
During my binge watch of past seasons of the show, I had become familiar with the set-up of the infamous villa: the infinity pool, the massive, shared bedroom where all contestants slept, the outdoor kitchen, the fire pit.
But to view the technical bones of the show like this, with every camera broadcasting to one spot, was a whole other experience; one that made my stomach churn.
This was where my future, as far as the viewing public was concerned, would be decided.
In a matter of hours, my face would be on these screens; I would be watched and talked about.
A storyline would be created, and I would play a role in it.
I wasn’t na?ve enough to think that the show, while essentially being shot and aired in real time, was without producer intervention.
I just hoped that I would be given a fair edit and at the end, when I left the villa, I would be able to walk back into the real world with my head held high.
A foreboding feeling lingered in my gut as we left the Hut and made our way to the wardrobe tent where I let the show’s stylists put me in whatever they wanted.
Had I been paying more attention at the time—was I not so distracted by the thought of being a pawn in the reality television game—I would have intervened.
I had already climbed back into the golf cart, Harry driving me down the road we came up, when the fog of panic in my brain cleared and I looked down at myself.
I blinked and then blinked again. I was wearing what could only be described as a single scrap of fabric.
The red material was so tight, the hemline so short, it was almost indecent.
My boobs were pushed up to my clavicles, and the shoes on my feet were so high I wasn’t sure I would last ten minutes in them, let alone the hours I knew were ahead of me.
“I can’t wear this,” I said to Harry, panic laced in my voice.
“Don’t be ridiculous, you look fantastic. Men love red. So do the viewers, according to all the focus groups. I had to bribe Tina in wardrobe to put you and only you in the color,” he said, beaming at me, thrilled that his intervention worked.
I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. It seemed I would have no choice in the matter. Even if I did, the way Harry was zipping back toward the villa made it clear that we were back to the tight schedule that I had been following since my arrival in Italy.
I wished we could have gone to that rocky outcropping at the edge of the property one more time. I wanted a moment for myself to stop and breathe and catch up to my life. I would have happily stood there, staring out at the sea, all day.
Soon enough, we were back where we started. Harry eased the golf cart to a stop at one of the white tents set up along the side of the driveway and turned to me.
“Poppy,” he said, hesitance in his tone.
“Harry,” I countered.
“This is as far as I go with you today,” he said.
“What! You can’t leave me. What am I supposed to do without you?”
“I’ll see you tomorrow for confessional interviews, and then I’ll be with you every step of the way, but for now, this is it for me. I’ll be in the Hut watching and rooting for you.”
“But what am I supposed to do? Like, logistically, where am I supposed to go?”
My brain was short circuiting. I had assumed that Harry would be by my side until the cameras started rolling. Did this mean that it was all about to start? Was my entrance into the villa only minutes away instead of the hours I had assumed it would be?
“Someone from sound will be by soon to meet you. They’ll explain how the mic works and get you all set up, and then one of the senior producers will take it from there.
Because the opening scene is such a production, they keep set as clear as possible.
All junior producers watch from the Hut.
Don’t worry, it won’t be much longer until you head up to the villa, so you won’t have to sit alone with your mind spinning, which I know it’s been doing all day. ”
So, he hadn’t been oblivious to the spiraling emotions I had been trying so hard to repress. I didn’t know if that made me feel better or worse.
“Poppy,” he continued, reaching out and gripping my hand in his.
“I know this is a lot, but the arrivals are the hardest part. Once you get in there, you’ll get to meet everyone, and then you can have fun.
I’ve seen past contestants make really special connections in here, whether it be romantic or even just friends. ”
I clutched his hand as I let his words wash over me.
“You’re going to have the best time,” he said. “Just be yourself and try to have some fun.”
We sat in the golf cart for a moment longer. For the millionth time, I was overcome with gratitude for him.
“Thanks, Harry. You’ve made this all really easy so far,” I said.
It had actually been far from easy, but I knew there was no chance I would have even gotten to this moment without him.
“I’m glad. Now get out of my cart. And remember, shoulders back and tits out when you walk into that villa,” he sang out.
Laughing at his advice, I disembarked the golf cart and stood by the side of the driveway, waving him off as he zipped away.
I walked into the holding tent and took a seat on a folding chair that had been set up.
I can do this, I repeated to myself. I can do this. I can do this. I can do this.
Maybe it could be as simple as Harry said.
Shoulders back, tits out.
***
Forty-five minutes later I’d been mic’d up by sound, re-bronzed and glossed and shimmered by makeup, and, to my surprise, had my boobs re-lifted by wardrobe.
If I had been a more modest gal I would have died on the spot when Tina, the tall, bleached blonde, head of the wardrobe department, walked into the tent, made a beeline for me and pushed my boobs up farther than I thought was physically possible.
“You’ll thank me later,” she said before swiftly turning back around and exiting the tent.
Nice to meet you too.
As I was about to live my life on camera, I supposed it was as good a time as any to let go of any delusions of privacy I was currently harboring.
And anyway, my boobs did look great, so I’d give Tina that.
When I was finally alone in the tent, all the people who had been buzzing around me for the better part of the last hour having filtered out, I tried to sit but found my knees bouncing so much that I was beginning to annoy myself.
So, I stood and paced. I would probably regret standing in my heels for longer than necessary later, but for the moment, I couldn’t stop moving.
It felt like the world around me had slowed down, and yet I was in fast forward. Like I was strapped to the front of a train that was barreling down the tracks, and I had no control over where it went or how fast it did so.
Finally, after what could have been either five minutes or five hours, the tent flap was pulled open, and I was ushered out. There, idling in the driveway, was a bright red convertible.
The car was beautiful: an old 1970s Mercedes with buttery, light tan leather interior and glossy red paint. It screamed “coastal Italian summer,” which I suppose was the whole point.
The PA standing next to the car instructed me to climb into the backseat. I did so, careful not to get the body makeup I was caked in anywhere that would stain. As I went to take a seat, they interrupted.
“Oh, no. You’ll need to be sitting on the top of the car, please,” they informed me.
“Safety not much of a priority then, is it?” I said, only to be ignored.
Carefully, this time so as not to let my heel puncture a hole in what I assumed to be very expensive leather detailing, I pulled myself up and onto the edge of the back row of seats. With nothing to hold on to, it was quite an unnerving position.
I looked around to make sure I was where they wanted me, but the PA was listening to something on their headset and walking away.
The burly man sitting in the driver’s seat must have seen the distressed look on my face in the rearview mirror, because he turned to me and said, “You alright, miss?”
All I could do was nod, which he seemed to take as a green light because then we were off, driving away from the holding tent.
I somehow managed not to fall backward and tumble off the car as he drove up the driveway and then came to a stop about halfway to the villa at what appeared to be a mini video village. There, two monitors and a handful of crew members stood, all watching the screens.
I tried to squint my eyes and catch a glimpse of what they were so absorbed in. Was it another contestant? I was desperate for any hint of what awaited me at the top of the driveway.
Callum’s eyes briefly flashed through my mind, his cold and confusing demeanor playing in my memory. I shook it off, not wanting to think of him. We’d be coming face-to-face soon enough.
Whatever was happening on the monitors must have come to an end because suddenly the group watching them turned to look my way.
Unsure of what to do with myself and the six pairs of eyes on me, I went with a wave.
I immediately regretted the choice when no one waved back.
In the middle of the group sat Cecilia. It was both a relief to see a familiar face and also a bit terrifying as it was her world I was operating in.
She got up from her chair and walked over to the idling car I was perched on.
“You alright?” she asked, her British accent crisp.
“Yes, great. So excited to be here!” I exclaimed, surprising myself with my own enthusiasm. If there were any time to fake it until I felt it, this was obviously it.
“Glad to hear it. We’ll be shooting your entrance now.
Cameras will be rolling the entire time, so just be aware of yourself.
Once you get to the top of the driveway and out of the car, you’ll walk up to the villa doors.
Then we will cut, reset, and go again to get the whole thing from a few different angles. Any questions?”
It was a relief to have solid actions to focus on, directions to follow. My mind could latch on to something other than worry.
I nodded down to Cecilia. “Got it,” I told her.
“Good. After this, it won’t be so orchestrated, but we just need to get the opening right, and then you can relax and enjoy the villa,” she said.
She nodded at me and walked back to the director’s chair in front of the monitors. She sat down and picked up her phone, immediately typing away on it.
I had a feeling that was as much encouragement as one would ever get from Cecilia. Remembering what Harry had told me about her not saying a word to a previous contestant she didn’t like, I took it as a win for myself that she had been the one to explain things to me.
One of the guys who had also been sitting around the monitors began calling out directions to everyone around me. “Cameras up!” he shouted.
A wave of anxiety, coupled with a tinge of excitement, rolled through me.
It had been a slow push to this moment, to the exact point when my journey on the show would officially begin.
I had been marking time over the last few days in anticipation of this.
When the cameras turned on and my role began.
When it all became real and not some wild, hypothetical scenario I had been ragged with worry about.
Now that it was really happening, I almost didn’t know what to do.
I took a deep breath and steadied myself on top of the convertible.
The car engine roared to life as someone called out, “Rolling!”
With a jolt, the car lurched forward.
I sat up straight and let it drive me to my new reality.