15. Millie
MILLIE
Brianna Hayes has been my friend since we did an off-Broadway production together four years ago where we both played prostitutes who got approximately seven lines each. She's also the only person in this industry I trust to tell me the truth without wrapping it in PR-speak or strategic silence.
We're at brunch in SoHo, a place with exposed brick and plants hanging from the ceiling. Brianna orders avocado toast and a mimosa, I get eggs and coffee, and for the first twenty minutes we talk about her new series on Hulu and whether her showrunner is terrible or just incompetent.
Then she sets down her fork and looks at me with the face of someone who's done with small talk.
"So. You and Duncan Ellington."
I take a sip of coffee that burns my tongue. "What about us?"
"You're engaged. Getting married soon from what I hear." She leans forward slightly. "How are you feeling about all that?"
"Fine. Good. We're taking it one day at a time."
"Millie." She says my name like a warning. "I've known you long enough to know when you're performing. And right now you're performing so hard I'm waiting for someone to yell cut."
I set my coffee down and look at her. Brianna is dark-skinned like me, with locs that fall past her shoulders and eyes that miss absolutely nothing. She's wearing a yellow sundress that looks effortless, and she's watching me with the patience of someone who has all day.
"It's complicated," I finally say.
"Relationships usually are."
"This one more than most."
She waits, doesn't push, just takes another bite of her toast and lets the silence linger until I'm the one who breaks it.
"Janie's escalating," I say. "Did you see the Hollywood Reporter interview?"
"I did. She's desperate."
"She's saying I'm manufacturing my Oscar campaign. That the engagement is strategy, that I'm using Duncan to make myself more relatable to voters." I pick up my fork and push eggs around my plate without eating them. "And the worst part is some people believe her."
"Some people will believe anything if it confirms what they already think.
" Brianna finishes her mimosa and signals the waiter for another.
"But Janie saying you're fake doesn't make it true.
And honestly? She looks bad for saying it.
Makes her seem insecure and petty, which is exactly what she's accusing you of being. "
"LaToya said the same thing."
"Because it's accurate. Janie's desperate for this Oscar in a way that's making her sloppy.
She's throwing everything at the wall to see what sticks, and so far nothing has.
" Brianna leans back in her chair. "Meanwhile you're out here living your life, doing your work, and looking like you're actually in love. That's what's driving her crazy."
The words land wrong. Or right. I can't tell anymore.
"What if she has proof though?" I ask quietly.
"Proof of what?"
"That Duncan and I are fake. That the whole thing is manufactured."
Brianna tilts her head. "Does she?"
"She says she does. But she hasn't provided anything yet, so maybe she's bluffing."
"Then she's probably bluffing. If Janie Torres actually had evidence that your engagement was staged, she would have leaked it already.
She's not the kind of person who sits on ammunition when she could be using it.
" The waiter brings her second mimosa and she takes a long sip.
"But here's my question. Are you actually fake?
Because from where I'm sitting, you two look like the real deal. "
My throat tightens. "We're engaged."
"That's not what I asked."
I don't know how to answer that, so I take another sip of coffee that's gone lukewarm. Brianna watches me with the face of someone who's already figured out the answer and is just waiting for me to catch up.
"He's… different than I expected," I say finally.
"Different how?"
"Thoughtful. Present. He remembers things I mention in passing, like how I take my coffee or which subway line I used to take to auditions when I was broke.
He shows up when he says he will and he doesn't perform for me the way he does for cameras.
" I pause. "And he defended me at some tech brunch yesterday.
Shoved a guy who said something disrespectful about me, in front of a room full of investors. "
Brianna's eyebrows rise. "He shoved someone?"
"It's on Twitter."
She pulls out her phone and scrolls for a minute, then watches the video with a face that shifts from curiosity to something softer. "Millie… That man is in love with you."
"He's performing."
"No, he's not." She sets her phone down and looks at me. "What are you going to do about it?"
"Nothing. We have a contract. Four more months, then we split quietly and everyone moves on."
"Except you don't want to split anymore."
"I didn't say that."
"You didn't have to." Brianna reaches across the table and takes my hand.
"I've watched you build walls around yourself since the day we met.
Every audition that went to someone else, every review that said you were too this or not enough that, you turned it into fuel and it got you here.
But at some point you have to actually let yourself have something good without assuming it's going to disappear. "
I pull my hand back gently. "What if I let him in and he realizes I'm not worth the effort?"
"Then you'll survive it the way you've survived everything else." She picks up her fork again. "But what if you let him in and he stays? What if this thing that started as strategy becomes the realest thing in your life? Aren't you at least a little bit curious what that would feel like?"
I am. That's the problem.
We finish brunch and split the check even though Brianna offers to pay.
Outside, the sidewalk is crowded with people carrying shopping bags and couples holding hands and tourists taking photos of buildings they'll forget by tomorrow.
Brianna hugs me goodbye and makes me promise to call her after the wedding.
The wedding.
Right. That's happening soon. A small ceremony, just us and a handful of people, designed to look intimate and romantic instead of staged. LaToya has a venue booked, a photographer lined up, and a timeline that gets us married in two weeks.
I stand on the sidewalk after Brianna leaves and pull out my phone. The video of Duncan shoving Brad Whitmore has been retweeted another ten thousand times since this morning. I watch it again, studying his face when he says my name. I can't stop thinking about it, replaying it in my mind.
Except thinking is dangerous right now. Because if I'm honest with myself, really honest, I've been falling for Duncan Ellington since the morning he brought me coffee exactly how I like it and admitted he'd been paying attention.
Maybe even before that. Maybe since the day he showed up to my film set and watched me work for six hours without complaining, or the night we spent in Washington Heights eating mangonadas and talking about the parts of our lives we usually keep private.
And if Janie Torres actually has proof that this engagement is fake, if she leaks it and the entire world finds out we've been lying to them for months, the backlash won't just destroy my Oscar chances. It'll destroy everything.