THE FOURTEENTH pt2
I scroll back up to the top and notice that the site is a well-known gossip site, one that also gleefully reported on my attempted suicide all those months ago by posting the pictures Hannah and Richard had released in all their gory glory. “Is there more?” I ask Alison quietly.
“Yeah,” Alison responds. “I’m so sorry, Abs. I thought you knew about this stuff.”
“It’s okay, Ali. I didn’t know. Mainly because I make sure I don’t look at these stupid sites. Unless it comes up on BBC news, then I don’t pay attention.” I let out a sigh of frustration wishing I could un-see the picture that makes me look so horrendous.
Alison gives me a brief hug before commenting that it’s all a pack of lies and anyone with half a brain knows that. I know she is trying to reassure me and I’m grateful but at the same time it’s a stark reminder that I don’t live in my own little bubble; that I am apparently newsworthy as Taylor’s wife.
Adam walks back through the door and walks across to me so Alison excuses herself after asking Adam if he would like anything.
“Sure, I’ll have a coffee,” he responds. “Thanks, Ali!”
“The usual?” she asks and Adam responds with a thumbs up. Their interaction is another reminder of the fragility of my bubble; clearly, these two know each other well enough that Alison knows his coffee order.
One look at my face lets Adam know that I’m not happy. “Paparazzi?” I bark at him.
“For the most part, Abby, we manage to spot them long before they can get near enough to take any decent pictures of you. We usually send them packing with a fierce warning not to come back but some are way more persistent than others. And when you are in public places it’s much harder to manage.”
“But why didn’t you tell me this was going on?” I ask in frustration.
“Because Taylor didn’t want you to know,” Adam replies firmly. I understand that he was just following orders, but still, it galls me to be in the dark like this.
“I don’t get it,” I respond. “Surely if I knew what was happening then at least I could have made your lives a bit easier.”
“That was the point, Abby. Taylor knows how much you hate having us trailing you around and so our instructions were always to be as unobtrusive as possible. So that you could be as normal as possible. Taylor has always been really insistent that you feel as free as possible to live your life like we weren’t there watching over you.”
Adam looks at me like he’s in pain and I get it. He’s been trying to protect me, him and Taylor and everyone else on Henry’s team. But what no one seems to get, is that to protect myself I need to know these things. Going through life in my little bubble is not getting me very far.
“So all this stuff on the internet?” I prompt needing to understand it all. Every last detail.
“We monitor it daily and Taylor’s press guys refute anything that isn’t true and get them to issue an apology and a retraction. The rest, we just have to leave and the attention eventually peters out.”
“Wow,” I say. “I never knew…” I trail off wondering about this large machine that seems to be dedicated to making my life seem as peachy as possible. But it’s all been an illusion and now that the truth is out, it’s hard not to let my imagination run wild. But I remember the dangers from the last time I searched myself out on the world wide web; the images still haunt my nightmares.
There is something about that picture that nags at me for the rest of the afternoon, long after Adam has gone off for a debriefing with Henry leaving me with his replacement, Kev. It’s only when I start chatting with my mother about the pictures, moaning about the fact that I look like such a slob in them–it really does seem like they have published the worst shots possible–when she asks to see the one that’s bothering me.
I quickly bring up the web page on my phone, its web address imprinted on my brain, scrolling through the links until I find the article that offends me the most. Passing it across to my mum, I wait as she scrutinises the picture. A moment later she snaps her fingers. “Abs, the picture was taken when we were in Harvey Nichols and we went up to the terrace for afternoon tea. You were messing around, saying you were so hungry you could eat the cake whole, and held it up to your mouth like you were going to devour it. The shot must have been taken just at that moment. You will probably find that there was a whole load taken that day, but that particular one was the one that sold for the highest price.”
“Bloody hell, Mum!” I exclaim feeling violated at the thought of someone tracking my every move and taking pictures.
“Unfortunately, the shots that sell these days tend to be the ones that generally show a person in the worst light. People don’t want to read about how you are blooming in pregnancy; they just want to make themselves feel better by reading drivel like this.” Mum lets out a sigh and gives me a sympathetic glance.
“Jeez, Mum, reading these makes me feel terrible,” I say, my tone as grim as my face.
“Then don’t,” she advises. “Don’t give them that kind of power over you. Just accept that they will write what they want but at the end of the day no one who knows you will believe a word of it.”
I let out a sigh knowing that my mother is probably right. I have to let this roll over me because if I start obsessing about it like I did last time, then I’m going to drive myself nuts.
“Besides,” she continues, “At the moment you are probably newsworthy because of all this stuff going on with Richard, but once that dies down and other celebrities start getting up to all sorts, you’ll see, the attention will die down.”
“You’re probably right,” I respond. “I just feel a bit stupid, being kept in the dark like this and not realising that all this stuff was being written about me. It makes me wonder what people think when they read this crap. Because someone out there must believe this stuff.”
“Oh, honey. Believe me, when you live in the public eye like this, you have to develop a thick skin. There have been times when I have been on shoots in the last few years when there have been pictures of me released without makeup and people going on about how I’ve aged disgracefully, blah, blah, blah. And yes, at first they upset me because inside I still feel like I’m twenty-one and I know I certainly don’t look it anymore. But at the end of the day I accepted that I’m not twenty-one, I’m actually fifty-four and I am still in demand and every wrinkle and scar I now have, they are all proof that I have lived my life. A full and amazing one at that.” I look at my mother in amazement and can’t help but hope that by the time I’m her age I have even a quarter of her wisdom.
“Thanks, Mum,” I say reaching over and squeezing her hand. “You always make me feel so much better. Right, Taylor’s party…” I say ready to put all this nonsense behind me and get down to business.