Page 18

I hate the sound of my name lately. Don’t even form the words around the K. You’ll only piss me off. I hate the words“I’m sorry, Kacy.”
Even more,“It wasn’t what it looked like.”
Oh, but Mother, it was.
“What do you want?” I seethe into the space inside my very cold car, swearing I won’t pick up the next time and knowing I will. “I said I quit and I mean it.”
The line is silent. I still hear her breathing, so I know she hasn’t hung up. If I had to guess, she’s insulted that me, Kacy Conner, the girl everyone runs to when they need help, quit two days before her engagement party.
“Kacy! Where the hell are you? I have so much to do, and I need you here.”
I exhale deeply. “I’m in my car. Somewhere between Flagstaff and fuck you.”
Tara draws in a quick hissing breath. “How dare you speak to me like that!”
“I can speak to you any way I want,” I snap, reaching for my package of candy on my passenger seat next to my one suitcase with all my belongings. I left everything else for my neighbor, who just lost her job and is supporting her teenage son on a waitress’s salary. Fancy furniture my parents bought to show me they loved me but didn’t want me living under their roof. Hundreds of thousands of dollars in clothes and shoes I never wore but took from shoots because they gave them to me. All hers. I don’t want any of it, and I won’t miss it. I take that back. I might miss my comfy bed.
“Do you have any idea what you’ve done?” Tara asks, as if I hadn’t thought this through.
“I don’t work for you anymore; therefore I don’t care what you think I’ve done.” I’ll never have to scrape dog shit off your shoes again. Literally, a true story of mine. I have many. All of which involve others taking from me and leaving very little left. If I were one of those sands of time tubes, there’d be only tiny grains left before I’m lost completely.
“Kacy, really? Do you realize what quitting will do to your career in fashion?”
“Career?” I snort. “Do you really think I want a career being someone’s bitch? When was the last time you made a decision for yourself? You can’t even choose what you eat for dinner. Or who you fuck.”
Yeah, I threw that one in there. Tara has certainly slept her way to the top. She’s twenty-four and well aware of the fact that most models’ careers begin to dwindle by the time they’re twenty-five. Because of that, she’s dating and recently engaged to playboy model and actor, Harrison Wayne.
She doesn’t love him, at least not any more than she loves money and fame. Hell, she still loves her ex-husband. Or should I say husband, because he’s yet to sign the papers for her.
I don’t know a lot about her husband, other than he’s from Texas, and they have two kids she hasn’t seen since she left the ranch he lived on. And you know, I can’t blame him for refusing to sign the papers because she’s a cunt and trying to fuck him over.
The first year I worked for Tara, I didn’t get paid. Not a dime. I was eighteen, wanted in the modeling industry because I thought it’d make my mom love me, and met Tara in the process. She was just starting out, and it seemed like a good fit. Turns out I’m not modeling material. Too sassy and have stretch marks on my ass and hips. Somewhere along the lines of picking up her laundry and delivering her Coke Zero on Sonic ice, I started getting paid. And my duties went from an assistant to very nearly God. She thought, and though I’m amazing, there wasn’t anything I couldn’t do for her.
And there wasn’t. Wanting to prove to my parents that even though I wasn’t the stick-thin model they wanted, I was really fucking good at my job. I also didn’t want my parents supporting me.
But Tara was unlike anyone I ever anticipated. Working eighty-hour weeks and operating on four hours of sleep, I’d have to wake up early to make sure she’s awake at the time she needed to be up, waiting with Egyptian coffee.
Towel waiting for her as soon as she stepped from the shower?
I did that.
Running to the CVS to get condoms for whoever was occupying her bed?
Again, me.
I once had to sniff her armpits before she went on the runway to make sure she didn’t have BO. Sadly, that’s not even the worst part of the levels to which I went to assure she liked me. And she never did. I’m the kind of person, or, used to be, who wanted to be friends with everyone, especially Tara Thomas. Everyone wants to be her friend because it means they’re part of the crowd.
Until now. Until I snapped. Thread severed. Line crossed, I’m done.
Do you know why?
Found my mom in bed with my boyfriend. You know who else had been sleeping with him?
Tara.
Though I’m not surprised, somewhere between my mom saying “it’s not what it looks like” and Tara laughing in my face when I confronted her about it, I decided I was done living for Camille.
And Tara, I can’t stand her. Sure, she’s everything this industry wants. Tall, beautiful, and sold her soul to the devil, and he doesn’t wear Prada. His name is Felix, her agent, and he owns her ass whether she wants to admit it or not. Sure, the parties are nice, the free clothes and the mansion, but at what cost?