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Chapter Five

I should’ve asked for a bed in the driver’s carriage of the train down south, considering the amount of times I’ve travelling to London since the show started airing.

It’s only been two weeks, and this is the third trip already.

It’s been fun, and I’m not complaining, but I don’t think anyone ever warned me how much work this whole ‘celebrity’ thing would be.

And, I don’t mean to sound arrogant, but I am.

A celeb, that is. Viewers absolutely love the show, I keep getting stopped in the street by random people, for the first few times I would reach to the back of my skirt, to make sure it wasn’t tucked into my knickers, or look down to my shoes for stray toilet paper.

I couldn’t believe that anyone was stopping me in the street for anything other than to point out something embarrassing.

It’s a brilliant feeling – and I love the fact that real people are buzzing about the show.

When people stop me to ask stuff, I soon realise the questions fall into three main groups: how to get into TV (I’ve got no magic answers here, I just tell people to be themselves); what the secret is to dancing in insanely high heels (I don’t know why anyone would ask me this if they’ve seen how often I fall over) and the thing they really want to know…

are Damon and I an item? That last one? That’s the killer question.

I’m not proud of the fact that the night after the press interviews, when the cast were staying in the same hotel and once we all went to bed, after drinking loads of course, there was a knock on my door.

It was Damo and, well, every TV viewer in the country now knows how weak I am when it comes to that man…

Ever since then he’s been messaging loads, non-stop even.

But have we managed to physically see each other again?

No. He keeps saying he’s busy and normally I know that sounds like a fob off, but I’ve seen the lad’s schedule – it really is jam-packed.

They keep getting booked for these things called PAs, as in personal appearances.

A more accurate term for them would be Pussy Ambush considering it’s just hordes of girls queuing up for a piece of Marc and Damon.

Even the lads who got dumped from the show in the early weeks, Shane and Reed, are doing them.

I’ve seen all the pictures and videos online, shots of all the girls, lining up at these dodgy nightclubs where the carpets are sticky with WKD, Smirnoff Ice and worse for all I know, desperate to meet the boys.

Damon is being pretty insistent in his messages that he doesn’t want any of the girls hounding them, just says they’re fans and he’s only being friendly.

He says as soon as his schedule allows, he’ll take me out on a proper date, something much fancier than the pair of us eating beef Monster Munch in bed (which was our morning tradition in the house, Monster Munch and a little cuddle, while venting about the others.)

Us girls don’t get booked for that many PAs, the promoters claim that lads don’t really show up in the same way.

Not because we’re not fit, of course. But just cause, I think, lads aren’t really into the whole fangirling thing, are they?

They either just want to see us in their magazines at home or go out to pull real birds, rather than spending an hour in a line for a peck on the cheek from me.

It’s a shame though, as the PAs pay really well and, despite being stopped in the street and being on one of the biggest contemporary shows on telly, I am officially skint.

Yesterday in Boots, my card got rejected, but the girl behind me recognised me and offered to pay!

It was so embarrassing, particularly as my order was thrush cream and a pack of chewing gum.

I pretended to the girl that there was a problem with the banking systems and took her number so I could pay her back.

But I don’t know when I’ll be able to, as my balance has dwindled down to ￡4.

45 which I need for a hangover sandwich and fizzy drink for the train home.

Thankfully, things are looking up. I’m in London for a photo-shoot, with the biggest celeb mag in town, Flair .

I’m so obsessed with this magazine that right now I wouldn’t even mind if I ended up in their Ring Of Regret, the famous page where they draw circles round stains on celebrities’ clothes, or slag them off for having dodgy tan lines and chipped manicures.

I’d take it as a sign I’d made it! Well, I would have before today, when I actually have made it, as they’ve invited me down to take my photo and then quiz me on all things North Stars .

When I get to the studio, I’m just so excited by it all.

The place where I get my picture taken is all white, with a big sloping wall, and it’s so pristine, like being on an untouched snowy mountainside.

I run straight to it and start pretending to ski, before the photographer comes over and tells me off for marking the floor with my trainers.

Oops. I’m ushered upstairs where Hollywood style mirrors line the corridor walls, the ones with the lightbulbs studded around them, and a lovely make-up artist called Verity, who’s going to be doing my glam for the day! But first, the clothes…

There’s a whole rail of them for me to try and a stylist who’ll choose different things for me to wear.

I’m praying I can keep some of them afterwards.

I’m given a handful to try first, as they want to see what I’m wearing before deciding on my style of make-up.

Which is how I find myself with only a thin curtain between me and the make-up artist and stylist, in a dress that doesn’t zip up, and a bare make-up free face.

This isn’t how I pictured the day going.

I’m trying so hard not to stare at my reflection but when it’s on three sides of you, that’s really hard.

It’s like I’m trapped in a haunted house of mirrors, except instead of scary clowns or skull faces it’s me, looking an absolute fright.

I decide that there must be something wrong with the dress, perhaps it was labelled with the wrong size, so I unhook the next one from its hanger.

But it doesn’t even go over my head, getting stuck around my tits.

So I try shimmying it up my knees, but it won’t budge past my hips. Great.

“Everything alright in there?” It’s the stylist!

But I’m too ashamed to confess, not yet, I’ll try the other two dresses first and if they fit, I’ll pretend I liked them best. So I just mutter a “fine, thanks” and try to step out of the dress now trapped around my knees.

All I can think about is that episode of Friends where Ross can’t get his leather trousers up and covers his legs in slippy lotion.

I scan the makeshift changing room (again, avoiding the actual sight of me) for some lotion.

How is it that I’m seriously considering that?

I know this is a struggle everyone’s endured.

I’ve certainly been here before, lying on the ground in changing rooms, trying to force up the zip on a pair of jeans.

It’s not a nice feeling but it’s not earth shattering.

Yet here, in this studio, miserable on a day I was so excited for, that’s exactly how it feels: earth shattering.

Because a voice hisses in my head that I’m fat and ugly.

Not just look, but am . Like Angie and everything I used to be, and stand for, is gone.

It doesn’t matter that I have friends and family who love me, that I’m nice to people and that I always offer a quid to the homeless.

That’s cancelled out by this grim reality: I’m just a fat, ugly blob of a being, who’s worth absolutely nothing.

Before, even when Robbie broke my heart and buggered off to Oz, I used to be able to quiet the hissing voice, assure myself I was being silly, of course I was hot, that it was silly insecurities maybe brought on by my period or something.

But I can’t do that, not now I’ve read everything people have been saying about me.

I know I shouldn’t, that it’s the equivalent of taking a pair of scissors and stabbing them in my thigh.

But what I’ve been doing, every night the show airs, is searching my name on Twitter and on this new Instagram app, following the hashtag #NorthStars.

Leo’s right: there are plenty of people who love me.

I only watch this for Angelica.

Angelica’s way too good for that himbo Damon.

She might party hard but you can’t deny she’s a genuinely sweet soul.

She’d be top quality on a night out. Love her.

Even so, there are people who really, really don’t like me.

Or, more specifically, really don’t like the way I look.

They’re contradictory too, one minute they’re calling me a beanpole, the next insisting I’m piling on the pounds.

I know I shouldn’t read the comments, as it’s a lose-lose situation.

But it’s hard to stop myself, considering every single bad thing I’ve ever thought about myself is being reflected back to me by hundreds of people.

Her body count is probably higher than her IQ.

She’s like a bus, everyone climbs onboard her and she’s getting wider than one now.

Angelica needs to close her legs and the fridge while she’s at it.

And now, my one chance to show the world (and Damon) I’m hot stuff has finally arrived and yet none of the clothes fit.

I’m yanking at the fabric of these lovely clothes and sweating profusely.

I try the final dress and nope, the zip just won’t budge past a certain point, no matter how much I hold my breath. I have to admit defeat.

“Excuse me,” I say, but it comes out a whimper and I have to repeat myself. “Excuse me, Tash, can you come here a minute?”