Chapter 10 The Game You Play
THE GAME YOU PLAY
I hadn’t intended to get this drunk. I promise. I wasn’t even going to come with how sore my voice has been all day. But it’s Renée Ross’s birthday party, otherwise known as one of the most exclusive events of the year, a yearly fixture in early June.
And I’m known to be on the guest list, so Jess and I decided it would look worse if I didn’t go. That people would run with the rumour that Luc and I have split. We planned for me to have one drink before slipping out at midnight like Cinderella.
I find myself at the bar again. The friend I made within an hour, Eliana – who must be one of Renée’s model friends, towering over six feet and absolutely gorgeous, black braids that reach halfway down her back – is asking if I want a drink. I’ve lost count of how many tequila shots I’ve had.
It can’t be good for my voice, but I’ll be in tour bootcamp before I know it and then I’ll treat my voice properly. One night can’t hurt too much.
Eliana hands me another tumbler. She leans in, her breath tickling my earlobe.
‘Whisky,’ she whisper-shouts, taking a sip.
I can smell it on her breath, the peaty, wooden smell with the cigarettes she’s been smoking all evening on the private terrace.
The smirk on her face is almost conspiratorial when I bring the tumbler up to my mouth and take a small sip, so small I only let the liquid dampen my lips.
‘Nice, right?’ she asks.
I nod, forcing myself to take a gulp, the liquid swirling around my mouth, my teeth.
It burns in my oesophagus. It’s definitely not good for my throat, but it lights a fire inside me.
The medicine I need to forget everything…
Luc’s hand in mine, the sweet coffee on his breath, the way he smiled at the brunette girl in the photo, his hand over mine while he tells me I can do anything I want to do.
The fact he didn’t respond to my text as soon as I saw the story asking if we could talk. Or the one I sent an hour ago accusing him of breaking a rule.
A man brushes past us, grabbing Eliana by the arm and pulling her away from me. She laughs, deep in her belly. ‘Back in a minute,’ I read her lips. And then I’m left at the bar at a loss, Luc’s words You’re Sienna Martin winding around my brain on a loop.
Everyone is so desperate for that coveted invite to Renée’s bash, but it’s no plus ones and everyone has to be exclusively invited by the supermodel herself.
She holds it at the same place every year: Tulip House, an extremely exclusive private members’ club in central London.
It’s a different theme every year, and everyone goes all out.
It’s like the Met Gala without the red carpet or the pictures, because no one is allowed any photos or phones inside the event.
Our phones are put in one of those bags which locks, forbidding access until they take the cover off when we leave.
Renée orders a social media blackout, with strict consequences if it’s broken.
More people let loose and have fun if they don’t have to care about their image.
We’re allowed to share pictures of what we wore, to flex the fact we were invited, providing the photos weren’t taken in the vicinity of the event.
We have to sign an order and, if someone breaks it, they’re strung up to dry.
They’ll never get an invite again. One model, who shared a photo of herself and her boyfriend from inside an event without realising one of Renée’s friends looked worse for wear in the background, found herself not only struck off the guest list for the party after that, but also from the list of all the big brands for Fashion Week.
She hasn’t walked in a major show since.
But it also means the hungry paps will hang about outside all the exits of Tulip House hoping to catch a glimpse of anything to do with Renée’s party, even if it’s simply the guest list.
Tonight’s theme is London Attractions, and I’m in a floor-length, gold, halter-neck dress with tiny clock sequins scattered across the skirt.
I’m Big Ben, in case that wasn’t obvious.
It’s a rented piece that Jess sorted from designer Kendra Heath, and I’ll be heartbroken to give it back.
One man is wearing what looks like a silver hula hoop at a forty-five-degree angle from his shoulder to his hip – Wembley Stadium, I guess?
– while another woman is in a floor-length chainmail dress, simple black underwear underneath.
I have no idea what she is, but she looks beautiful.
There are hundreds of people, their faces distorted by alcohol and neon lights, buzzing through the room, their costumes reflecting spotlights back like a mirror in the sun. A floppy-haired man enters the room in the far corner and my eyes double take. My feet are walking before I tell them to.
Luc?
I spent an hour and a half this afternoon looking through the people Luc follows on Instagram, trying to find the woman he spent the afternoon with, despite Jess warning me not to.
Warning me that it would make me feel worse.
Obviously, Luc and I are not together. He can do what he wants.
But no one gets to make me look like an idiot.
I don’t care really who she is, I’m more annoyed that he broke a rule and made me look stupid while I was singing about how in love with him I was. My blood felt hot, cheeks flushed, but I still can’t explain the vague empty feeling in the pit of my stomach.
Three steps closer and it’s not Luc at all. The man’s hair is straight, none of those signature curls in sight.
Everyone is standing in groups in the dark, huddled closely in the small corners to block anyone else from joining.
I take a sip of whisky, scrunching my nose, while I look around the room, analysing each group for one with the biggest opening.
There’s a group of actors from a series of vampire movies I’ve never seen standing by the door to the staircase which leads to the bathroom.
They’re looking at everyone who walks past them, analysing their outfit stitch-by-stitch, their faces cell-by-cell, and then launching into a discussion.
I don’t want to be a part of that. I take comfort in being back at the bar – an observer, rather than the observed.
I glance at my watch, which I don’t usually wear but needs must when we can’t use our phones. And I am dressed as a fucking clock. Twenty-five minutes to twelve. I could get away with going home now, sneaking out the back.
‘Sad girl drinking at the bar is an aesthetic that suits you.’ The voice is dry, hoarse in a way that says it’s been shouting over music all night. It’s familiar, but not familiar in the warm way which feels like home.
Alex Pauls.
His hair is pushed back off his face with matte wax, but there are no little white balls of the stuff in the same way my brother is dusted in after styling.
‘Sad girl doing anything is an aesthetic that suits me.’
‘If you’re going to be sad, you might as well look pretty doing it.’ Alex sits on the bar stool I’m standing next to and puts a finger up to call for the bartender’s attention. ‘I’ll grab two of whatever Sienna’s drinking.’
Alarm bells go off in my head, bringing me back to when I was sixteen and just getting started in the industry when Alex Pauls won his fifth Oscar. My childhood celebrity crush is sitting opposite me in a bar nearly fifteen years later.
And I can’t even do anything about it because of that rule with Luc.
The rule that Luc has already broken.
Fuck him.
‘You want to try out the sad man drinking whisky at the bar aesthetic?’ I ask.
‘Hm, not quite.’ He clears his throat. ‘I could never be sad drinking with you, Sienna Martin.’
The internal alarm screams. The type that tells me alcohol is making a decision for me, that I’m about to do something I’ve told myself hundreds of times that I shouldn’t. But also, that I won’t be able to stop myself.
The brunette and the smile that adorned Luc’s face in that photo will live in my nightmares for the next few weeks, but at least for now I’m free. I have no obligation to follow that rule now that he broke it first.
‘We didn’t get to talk at the premiere,’ Alex says.
‘These things are always so busy,’ I say noncommittally. ‘You never get to speak to everyone you want to speak to.’
‘So, why are you sad, Sienna Martin?’
The bartender puts two more whiskies down in front of us and I immediately take a big gulp. The bartender makes himself scarce to polish the glasses.
I shrug. ‘My Grampy died.’
Alex watches me while I pin my attention on the bartender. ‘Shit, I’m really sorry, Sienna.’
Why does everyone say that when they’ve learned about a loss?
Like it was their fault? It’s a weird way to make themselves feel better before they break into a different conversation, too uncomfortable to hear about anyone who has passed on in fear that the person will cry or break down.
I break my gaze and pick up my drink, moving my hand in circles so the drink swishes around in the bottom.
‘Is this how seasoned whisky drinkers drink?’ Alex questions, doing the same with his glass.
‘Oh, I wouldn’t know,’ I admit. ‘Only had my first today.’
‘Thank god.’ Alex laughs. ‘I’m much more of a rosé man myself.’
A loud laugh escapes my lips, from the depths of my stomach to rattle in my chest. ‘You’re such a pick-me.’
‘Damn. I thought that was a good line.’ At least he’s being a good sport.
‘Try again, Pauls.’
‘What I really drink most is lager or white wine.’ He takes a big mouthful and forces it down his throat with two large gulps. He shivers, coughing when his mouth is empty.
‘Maybe what you should have ordered is a lager or a white wine.’
‘That’s the last time I try to impress a pretty girl.’ He gets closer to me, leaning forward on his chair so that his mouth is nearer to my ear. The hairs on my arms stand to attention.