#GrayKat
Outside, I’m smiling.
Inside, I’m screaming.
Moving between several different recording rooms, we do three radio interviews back to back — joking and giggling while the microphones are live, holding hands to keep up the appearance of a loving couple as we enter the recording studio and greet each host. They’ve all heard the news, by now. Clips from our interview with Eileen have been playing on a loop on every entertainment site, trending worldwide on every social media platform, and freeze-framed on the front of every gossip magazine.
The radio personalities want to know about everything — all our firsts. First kiss, first date, first moment he knew I wasthe onefinally worth giving up his man-whorish ways for.
The saddest thing is, we don’t have to fabricate much. It sounds, to the unknowing ear, like a fairy tale: two childhood co-stars, reunited after a decade of distance, starring in the most epic romance of the year. A love tailor-made for movie screens.
Unless, of course, you know the truth.
That the hero wouldn’t stay.
That the heroine couldn’t change his mind.
That it wasn’t really love at all — just the potential for something wonderful, wasted on two people who were never meant to be.
I smile as I listen to Grayson talking about our waterfall hikes on the shores of Oahu, I laugh as I hear him describing our moments drinking rum beneath the stars. I’m the perfect impersonation of a happy, star-crossed girl, chiming in with careful details here and there, to flesh out the tale. But, all the while, inside me something is unraveling. The last shred of attachment, cut clean through with the sharp blade of his calculation, for I cannot fathom how he could so casually lay bare all our secrets for strangers, or use our story as fodder for the masses.
All for what?
Soundbites and ticket sales.
I sit beside him, listening to him talk about our love affair as if it happened to someone else, and know that he is not the man I thought he was, nor the man I wished he could be. The Grayson Dunn in my head has always been an embellished version of his true self — kinder, more compassionate, infinitely more caring.
I have been loving and hating and mourning an illusion.
When we reach the car, he holds open my door like a gentleman, but there’s anger in his eyes. I rip my hand from his grip as soon as we’re out of the paparazzi’s line of sight. He slams my door with a bit more force than necessary. I smash the buckles of my seatbelt together with a harsh click, then stare pointedly out the window as he climbs into the driver’s seat and starts the engine.
Neither of us speaks. We have used up all our falsely bright words and unfailingly happy smiles on strangers. The only thing left to simmer in the air between us is resentment and rage.
The drive home is slow and silent. It calls to mind another car ride with him, back before everything got so sad and twisted and broken between us, when he dropped me off after playing chess in my favorite park. It seems far longer than two months have passed, since then. I was a different girl entirely. Someone I don’t even recognize.
We pull up to my security gate and I murmur the code under my breath. He punches it in with aggressive jabs and pulls silently up to my front walkway. The car has barely pulled to a stop but I’m already reaching for the door handle, eager to escape him.
“See you tomorrow,sweetheart,” he snaps as I step outside.
“Can’t wait,darling,” I drawl, voice thick with sarcasm.
I slam the door and disappear inside.
The next day follows a similar pattern as theUnchartedpress junket continues — we do two more talk show sit-downs in front of a studio audience, then make an appearance at AXC to take photos with fans who’ve paid for a VIP studio tour package. I spend hours smiling until my cheeks ache, laughing at things I find humorless, letting Grayson run his hands over my body and leaning into his touch instead of smacking his hands away.
It’s painful… but it’s part of the job.
For days, I barely see anyone except Grayson. Harper comes over in the mornings to do my makeup and Masters checks in on me at night, but the majority of my waking hours are spent alone with my co-star, either grinning at each other for the cameras or glaring at each other in private. We don’t discuss the hostility burning bright between us. There’s nothing left to say. Rehashing the same old arguments would be a waste of breath, and we’re both too stubborn to apologize — him for his hasty actions, me for my antagonistic words.
By the third day, the tension has reached a breaking point. It’s Christmas Eve, and everyone around us is practically overflowing with holiday spirit… which only seems to make our silent war of wills more strained by comparison. There’s something physically draining about being surrounded by happy people when you’re acutely miserable. Perhaps that’s why suicide rates skyrocket this time of year. Depression in the face of all that god-awful cheer makes you wonder if something is wrong with you, down to your DNA.
We’re walking back to Grayson’s car after a particularly mundane interview with a panel of popular teenage internet bloggers who Sloan assures us areinfluencers, when a paparazzo slips through the security perimeter on the sidewalk, camera shoved close to our faces.
“Grayson! Kat! Can I get a picture of the two of you?”
His voice is piercing, and his question is less request than confirmation — I can hear his shutter clicking down rapidly as we try to skirt around him. The security guards are occupied, holding back a swarm of teenage girls desperate to get close enough to touch the legendary Grayson Dunn.
“Hey!” I snap, pushing the telephoto lens away when it practically smacks me in the nose. “Watch it!”