JANUARY 2003
AMOS PHONED HOURS AFTER THE TANSY ARRIVED. IF war was on, he said, then he had to be a part of it. We argued and then I told him to be at my house early the next morning. So I was back, in a dress selected by him, and I wondered if Harper was too, because they mirrored.
I saw her catch it—ahead of me on the carpet, a quick look before she was moving along to the next camera.
I caught up to her at the very end, snatched her wrist, and watched the cameras pivot from Mandy Stein to us, shadowed by the hotel’s doors.
“We could make this more interesting,” I said—had been preparing this little pitch since the moment the news of our dual nomination broke. Winning wasn’t enough—I wanted her on her knees. Collared by my shoelaces. Kissing my goddamn feet. “Winner gets—”
“Not now,” she said, not even looking at me as she shrugged me off—like she hadn’t sent a declaration of war hand wrapped to my home.
She stepped away just as Joel turned from the cameras, concluding his interview.
He narrowed his eyes at me, but Harper was holding her hand out, stepping toward him.
She took hold of his elbow and didn’t look back.
I watched her take every step—so I saw when another figure appeared from the shadows up ahead.
Pale pink satin. Hair a gentle curve over one shoulder. The undeniable flashes of Harper in her gaze, her smile, the way she held herself.
Greta Liao.
My stomach clenched, hand drawing so tight around the chain of my bag it might have cut.
Harper kissed her mother’s cheek. Joel clapped her shoulder in a half-hearted hug.
A happy fucking family.
The room slanted, tilted so sharply I stumbled.
And it wasn’t just that I was here and I was alone and Harper had everything (that my parents were rotting in a casket, as indifferent to me as ever) but that Greta wasn’t on the red carpet.
That her dress paled before her daughter’s.
There was no effort here for her to leverage Harper’s fame to her own advantage.
She was just here for her daughter—like Harper had always wanted.
I watched the three of them disappear into the auditorium and had to let the door close before I could take another step.
———
When they declared me the winner, it took all my effort not to look for Harper in the crowd.
I wanted to see her eyes on me. But I wasn’t sure what I’d do if I looked up and found her whispering to her mother or examining the nails of a hand clasped in Joel’s or rummaging through her bag for the lipstick smudged into the corners of her lips.
There would be more. Screen Actors Guild Awards and BAFTAs and Oscars and others I no longer cared to consider. There would be more chances. I’d do it right next time.
When we emerged at the end of the ceremony, the award felt weighted, like I could swing it if it came to that.
Greta must have already left, but Joel, as always, was by Harper’s side. She curled into him like he was the better trophy, like she’d already won. But as I passed, I heard him say: “Easy to win when you’re not acting at all but reenacting your own fucked-up past.’”
I stumbled before I could decide whether to whirl on him or pretend I hadn’t heard. But when I turned, I wasn’t the only one who seemed furious. He was half-laughing and looking expectantly at Harper who glowered in return.
“Come on, I’m only joking,” he said when it became clear Harper wasn’t entertained.
She sighed. “You’re never joking, Joel. And it’s never only anything.”
She walked away before he could respond.
I turned too, thinking of Cannes and the way he’d tried to warn me away from her. I didn’t need Joel trying to fight Harper’s battles for her and evidently she was just as irked—I was Harper’s to exsanguinate. No one else could bleed me quite like her.
Why was he trying to step into this?
But then, watching him follow, I truly took note of the words she said. And I realized it wasn’t about me at all.
I’d just beaten her on a global stage, and she’d already turned her focus elsewhere.
My fingers clenched in the pockets of my satin gown—one of my conditions of Amos’s return, no more death traps, and dear god, give me some pockets—and I put it down to the itch for another trophy to hold.
A need to best her again and again and again until she never thought to look at anybody else.