Page 168

In less than twelve hours, I’d be arriving on the red carpet, attending the Oscars for the first time as a nominee. That alone would have been anxiety-inducing, but tonight, Dillon was coming as my date.

I’m not really sure what we were thinking. Our first official public outing as a couple probably would have been better served a little more low-key. For instance, we could have had a quiet dinner atNobu Malibuor maybe attended a soccer match to watchAngel City. But no, straight to the Academy Awards. Go big or go home, right? Or, as Elliott liked to say:lights, camera, action—or cut!

Despite it being her decision to come, I was concerned about how she would handle the press and the massive amount of publicity we would receive. But my sympathy was quickly abated when I glanced over from my midnight turmoil and found her peacefully asleep. I considered bumping her, or tugging off the duvet, ‘accidentally’ forcing her awake to join me in my worry, but begrudgingly, took the high road, and chose to leave her to her halcyon dreams. It did little good for both of us to lie here, staring at the ceiling.

Instead, sacrificing what little time was left in the smallhours of the morning, my thoughts wandered, replaying the journey of the last two years, and what had led us here.

Three weeks after walking away from Leeds—after officially announcing her retirement as a professional triathlete—she returned to LA.

We needed to talk, she told me.

My heart sank. I thought she was coming to end things.

So needless to say, I was stunned when we walked down to the Santa Monica pier in the quiet hours of early morning, and she told me she didn’t want to hide anymore. That she was ready for us to live openly, if that was still what I wanted.

I told her I needed a couple of days to think about it—I didn’t—but I wanted to give her a chance to change her mind. I didn’t want her to feel pressured into believing the only way we’d have a future together was if she stepped outside her comfort zone. But this time, she was adamant.

What had changed, I wanted to know?

She wasn’t able to give me a pinpoint answer. In some ways,nothing. In other ways,everything.

Part of it, I think, was that she’d been seeing a new therapist. Someone different than the sports psychologist she’d relied on throughout her career. And though she didn’t talk to me about everything she was going through, I understood a lot of her healing centered on building a new sense of self and finding ways to address her fears.

The media was going to be relentless, I warned her.

I was worth it, she assured me.

So it was settled.

The next big question was how we were going to handle it. Did I want to wait until we’d wrapped onSand Seekers? Did I need to warn the studio? Did I want my PR team to curate an announcement?

No. And no. And no.

I didn’t want to ask permission. I didn’t want to be managed. I didn’t want a ‘coming out statement’ handcrafted to mitigate backlash and keep my image ‘on brand.’ I just wanted to be able to post the occasional stupid selfie with my girlfriend—to end the speculation on what guyEntertainment Weeklycurrently thought I was blowing.

So, we came up with a plan, and a week later, to the horror of my unprepared manager, and utter delight of the media frenzy, we posted a photo on my Instagram.

Amusing myself, and tolerated—with numerous good-natured eye-rolls—by Dillon, I restaged the viral photo the Uber driver had taken off her dashcam: Dillon—her hair askew, cheeks flushed, and clothing disheveled—and me—wearing her jacket, my lips swollen, the top button of my pants unfastened, looking exactly as if I’d just been freshly fucked in a castle cathedral on a whim. I completed the image with lipstick on Dillon’s collar and a hickey—no makeup required—below my ear.

I captioned it:OK, fine: I lied. More than ‘just friends.’ She’s my person.And then posted it to my 150 million followers on Instagram.

And you know what? The world didn’t implode (the same could probably not be said of my manager’s head). The studio didn’t fire me (fat chance of that, anyway—no offense, but I was Kameryn Kingsbury). I wasn’t even struck down by a bolt of lightning from the heavens.

I got some hate mail—but honestly, what celebrity didn’t?—a few hundred marriage proposals, and an invite to speak at GLAAD. And that was pretty much that. I received over a hundred thousandlikeswhen I changed my Facebook status fromit’s complicatedtoin a relationship, which I still find kind of wild.

Dillon had long since deleted all her social media, so other than having to put up with me posting the occasionalTikTokvideo of her cooking French toast in my kitchen, her life as the now-acknowledged love ofmylife, didn’t change. We dealt a little with the paparazzi—it was just a part of life for me—but for the little time we were seen in public together, it didn’t bother her the way I think either of us had been afraid it might.

Life simply went on.

Three weeks later, I shot my final pick-up forSand Seekers. It was an emotional, fulfilling moment for me. Two and a half years, tens of thousands of miles traveled, over a thousand hours of raw footage, and my journey as Addison Riley in Margaret Gilles’ beloved trilogy was complete.

I went to the wrap party solo—Dillon was back in Wales, helping Seren prepare to fly Épée to Los Angeles—and at the end of the night, after endless hugs, probably one too many martinis, and a hitch in my side from laughing too hard at the blooper reel, I was surprised when Elliott strolled up to the podium and said he had an announcement.

The ballroom at the Ritz quieted, five hundred sets of eyes turning toward where he’d tapped the microphone. He wasn’t drunk, I noted, and he wasn’t quite smiling.

He told the room he’d be brief, promising this wasn’t just another longwindedgoodbye, see you laterspeech.

And then, without fanfare, without a joke or drumroll, he proceeded to announce that he was gay. He said he was tired of living a lie and that his press agent would be making an official statement the following afternoon. But he wanted us to hear it from him first.