31 This poisonous sadness

Mark

"Lauren wants me to give you her number," I said to Jamie as I go through his social media account on his phone.

Jamie was driving me to Steve's for my recording session at 10. I was going to call a cab, but he offered, and anyway, I needed to catch up on social media. Kate had updated her status with an outtake from a magazine photo shoot, her caption was the name of the magazine and the date it was going to come out. Other than that, zip.

"Why?" Jamie sounded sincerely clueless. I shot him a side glance. I swear, this guy is becoming a better actor by the day.

"Wasn't that you, flirting with her like hell backstage the other day?" I clicked on the Likes tab and clicked on Following and scanned it to check Kate's activity.

"I've decided that while she looks like Antonia, she isn't," he shrugged.

"Like how Veronica looks like Antonia but isn't either?" I asked because Kate had liked Veronica's latest selfie from her dance practice today.

"Veronica doesn't look like Antonia," Jamie deadpanned.

"Are you kidding, they're like mother and daughter," I scoffed. Then, as if Antonia could hear us, I quickly added, "You know, if Antonia had given birth to her when she was 12."

"If you have to say that in public, Antonia will forgive you if you said they could be twins," Jamie chuckled. "But they can't, they don't look alike."

"Yeah, whatever," I said, embarrassed enough. Having lost all my options for stalking Kate, I search up my name in the hashtags. One stood out: #belikeMarkNextDoor. I clicked it open.

The actual post had nothing to do with Boy Next Door at all, it was a video clip of a girl, a ballerina, doing these jumps while her feet were quickly intertwining with each other in mid-air. I've never seen that before, it was mesmerizing. After it looped three times, I scrolled down to look at the caption, puzzled why she used that hashtag for this.

"Petit allegro is hard! Especially when your legs are too long. I must figure out how to move them faster so that I hit the correct beats, just like how Mark from Boy Next Door has mastered sharp lunges with his impossibly long legs. If he can do it, so can I! #belikeMarkNextDoor"

"Dude, this is awesome," I exclaimed. "This ballerina girl posted a clip of her dancing and saying she wants to be like me!"

"Be like you, the slutty man whore?" Jamie raised an eyebrow. "Yes, that is every ballerina's dream."

"Dude, no, seriously," I tried to show him the post. "She said she needs to learn how to make her legs move faster, like I do."

"I don't get it," he said.

"You have to look at her video."

"Yeah, but I'm driving. Later," he promised. He smiled. "Is she a Geend? How nice to have a ballerina Geend."

"Don't tell me, we should get her for the next music video," I snorted.

"Wow, Mark, that's a great idea..."

I scrolled through her page. Her name is Juliette. Her page was mostly ballet stuff, videos of her in dance practice, photos of her dancing, and photos of ... food. She's so skinny, I didn't think she ate at all, but here's a really compelling plate of nachos on her feed that just now made me hungry.

My stomach growled, loud enough for Jamie to hear. He chuckled and said, "Too bad you have a photo shoot tomorrow."

"Ugh, leave me alone," I said. I scrolled more, and then saw a video clip of us in concert. I opened the post, and tapped for sound. We were singing Can't Breathe, and I was about to rap.

~

This poisonous sadness has ripped all my love apart

I shed tears that feel like broken ice from my heart

It flew away, in the end, you threw me away

Your sharp perfume is cutting deeply into me...

~

"Is that Can't Breathe?" Jamie peered at his phone, but had to look back at the road again.

"I know, right, this song's following me around," I laughed and we sing along to Steve singing, "Gotta be with you, by my side..."

I take a look at the caption. She just quoted the lyrics of the second part of the rap: "Without you, I can't breathe! I'm feeling fatigued! You're the oxygen I need! Like oxygen, like oxygen, like oxygen, you are..."

Jamie parked the car and pulled the hand brake. "Let me see..."

"Wait, this one..." I pulled up the other post where I'm her hashtag and source of inspiration. Jamie studied it and nodded.

"Her legs are long so she has difficulty in quickly pulling them in," he said. "Maybe you can still learn ballet, what do you think? That could be its own video!"

I pulled the phone away. "Don't be ridiculous," I laughed. Yes, I was laughing, happily.

"I want my phone back, though," Jamie rolled his eyes and undid his seatbelt. He got out of the car and I smelled a faint, familiar smell, like someone had sex. Wait, why did Jamie get down from the car? I undid my seatbelt and followed after him.

"You're coming down too?" I asked, handing him his phone as he pressed the lock on his key. I looked at the parking situation. LJ's car was gone, but Antonia's was parked in front of Jamie's. I smiled when I realised, Jamie came here for Antonia. "Can you wait to take me home, then?"

"You're such a dork," he rolled his eyes at me and together, we walked towards Steve's front door.

We had to pass the recording studio first and we could hear them talking from the window. Usually, that room is sound proof, but someone must have opened the window a bit, and their voices carried through it. I stopped because Antonia was talking about me. It seems she saw Twelfth Night and said I was "really growing as an actor." I grabbed Jamie's arm and squeezed it, feeling really high from the praise.

"And the way he looks at Viola, like he could eat her alive," Antonia squeed, nearly making me squee as well. I calmed down right away when I looked at Jamie's face and saw he was not also squeeing. Of course.

"So you're into that kind of thing, being eaten alive," Steve scoffed at her, probably grossed out and reminding her that she's talking about his bandmate.

"Oh, well, you would know, since you've eaten me alive already."

I stared at Jamie as my heart fell to my stomach and watched his face transform into the darkest rage.