Perfect. Instead of relying solely on precariously posed selfies, Mari could take a few full-body shots, too. I’d been worried about how to pose with those FRANGELICO shoes—turned out, in real life, they were pretty ugly—but a panoramic photo that minimized the shoes and maximized the setting would work wonders.
Hump day was busy as ever at the beach, with people lying on blankets, wading in the water, and jogging along the shore. Toward the far end, in the shadow of some big boulders, there was a fully dressed couple holding hands and leaning against a shopping cart filled to the brim with overstuffed bags. The beach was a haven for the homeless, and while the occasional uppity tourist complained to the lifeguards about their presence, for the most part, it was a place where everyone peacefully passed the time.
Like any good Instagrammer, though, I would have to pretend I was the only person here. That the beach was my private photo studio, with no other sign of human life for miles. I found a relatively untouched stretch of sand, well south of the lifeguard tower, and dropped my bag of collab goodies at my feet.
First up, I’d tackle the small nonwearable items, things I could hold in one hand while taking a photo with the other: a phone case, a tube of hand lotion, a bottle of kombucha. Those heavy-duty rubber gloves I’d worn all day did an excellent job of protecting my freshly painted manicure, an iridescent blue polish I’d chosen to go with my beachy theme.
I held up each item, angled correctly to get a good view of the label or pattern or whatever the brand manager asked me to feature, and I snapped a slew of photos. Some with waves in the background, some with sky. Then I put each product down in the sand, arranging shells and rocks around them in interesting patterns, and snapped some more. Sometimes, I included props of my own, like sunglasses and flip-flops. A particularly pretty piece of dried-out kelp accessorized the green tube of hand lotion nicely.
While setting the stage for the kombucha shoot, I spotted Mari trudging toward me over the sand, with a giant bag slung over one arm. She waved, smiling, but as she grew closer, her eyebrows knotted together.
“What’s all this?” Leaning down, she picked up the kombucha and read the label out loud. “‘Detox your adrenals with this powerful miracle elixir.’ What does that even mean?”
“I don’t know.” Feeling instantly defensive, I snatched the bottle back.
Her eyes traveled from the kombucha to the hand lotion to the half a dozen other items spilling out of my tote bag. “Oh. This is one of those nano-influencer shoots, isn’t it?”
“Technically, I’m not a nano-influencer anymore because I’ve gained more followers. I’m now a micro-influencer. But yes, it is a photoshoot.”
“Are you getting paid to shill this crap?”
“It’s not crap!” Well, not all of it was crap. That hand lotion was actually really luxurious. “And yes, I’m getting paid, if you count the free merchandise as payment.”
“But you’re not getting paid in actual cash?”
“No.” With Mari’s negative attitude, I wasn’t sure if she’d be willing to help me get the photos I needed. But the sun was rapidly setting and there were only a few quality minutes of golden light left in the day. “Would you do me a really quick favor? I need a couple of full-body shots, but I can’t get them on my own.”
She smirked. “Will I be getting compensated for my photographic skills?”
“You can have these after I’m done modeling them.” I pulled the FRANGELICO heels from my tote bag, and Mari made a dry-heaving noise.
“Those are the fugliest shoes I’ve ever seen.”
“I know. I’m thinking maybe you could shoot them from far away.”
“Like outer space?” She looked around the beach and pointed at a cluster of large rocks in a secluded corner. “You could stand on a rock and I could shoot you from below.”
“Good idea. Thanks.” I wiggled out of my cover-up, so I was wearing nothing but a string bikini, then slipped on a pair of sunglasses and a wide-brimmed hat. Stepping into the shoes, I pointed my toe and said, “What do you think?”
With her eyes on my feet, Mari said, “I think you’re lucky I love you, because this is utterly ridiculous.”
After the shoes, I modeled a white T-shirt that said PLAY SLAY ROSÉ in huge black block letters, followed by a fairly nondescript cross-body bag. When we were all done, I put my cover-up back on and packed away my stuff. “Thanks so much, Mari. I really appreciate it.” Nodding to the plastic bag she’d brought with her, I asked, “What’s in there?”
“Oh, that’s why I wanted to come by and see you. It’s Rob’s drone. I told you I’d return it.”
“You didn’t have to. He’s never used it and it’s not like he’s coming back anytime soon. Wanna keep it?”
“Nah. That video didn’t perform as well as I thought it would, so...” She dragged her toe back and forth through the sand, watching the patterns shift, avoiding eye contact. Clearly, she was still riding a wave of self-doubt.
“Are you working on anything else right now?” I asked.
“I haven’t been feeling particularly inspired lately.” I opened my mouth, but she interjected before I could get any words out. “If you’re going to suggest I look to this Demi DiPalma woman for inspiration, it’s a hard pass. You know, I googled her after we talked the other day. She’s a scam artist.”
Here we go again with the scams. “Look, I know her ideas seem a little out there, but—”
“They’re a lot out there.”
“That doesn’t mean they don’t have value.”
“Demi DiPalma has no credentials whatsoever. She’s not a certified life coach, she’s a ‘lifestyle guru.’ There’s a big difference. Actually, I’m pretty sure she was a social media manager for some marketing firm before she hit it big with her vlog, which should tell you something.”
“It tells me that she’s hardworking and ambitious and built a successful business from the ground up all by herself.”
“Really? Because it tells me that she’s good at manipulating people into giving her money. You know those Demi DiPalma–brand essential oils she sells on her website that she claims will help ‘manifest abundance’?” She rolled her eyes, as if she couldn’t stand how gullible some people were.
“That’s pretty condescending, Mari. Even if you don’t believe in it, it’s not right to look down on someone who does.”
“It’s not about looking down on people. Believe whatever you wanna believe. But she charges a 50% markup on everything in her shop, simply because she slaps a label with her name on it. Her expensive ‘boot camps’ are a joke, too. They’re really just glorified PowerPoint presentations filled with links to other sources on the internet. And don’t get me started on the jade egg.”
“What’s the jade egg?”
With a sigh of disgust, she picked a stone up off the sand and held it aloft. “It’s a four-hundred-dollar rock you stick in your vagina.”
“Um...why?”
“According to your girl Demi, to ‘detoxify negative sexual energy.’”
“It sounds like a yeast infection waiting to happen.”
“Exactly.” Mari squeezed the stone in her hand and took a deep breath. “Look, I’m not saying that energy isn’t real, and I’m not ragging on people who subscribe to that philosophy, either. If that works for you, then that’s great. I just think it’s pretty shitty to market a bunch of wildly overpriced items to people who are down on their luck or full of self-loathing or just plain desperate to change their lives. She takes advantage of people in their worst moments, and for that, she’s a scammer.”
I thought back to the very first sponsored post that showed up in my Instagram feed a couple of weeks earlier. In it, Demi DiPalma had asked if I was struggling to make ends meet, mere moments after I’d searched Google for a way to earn fast cash. Clearly, I’d been targeted, and then ins
tantly directed to her website, where I could buy a “No Excuses” T-shirt for $39.99. So maybe Mari had a point.
Maybe I was being taken advantage of.
Then again, I’d made some big, positive changes in my life since I’d read The Aspirational Action Plan, hadn’t I? I chucked Rob’s crap out of my apartment, I started Bree by the Sea, I swam in the ocean with a hot surfer, for crying out loud!
“Fair enough,” I said. “But it’s not an all-or-nothing kind of thing. You can take the parts that work for you and leave the rest. I don’t have to buy stuff from her shop to recognize that her ideas have merit.”
“Do her ideas have merit?”
“Yes, of course!” Pointing to my bag of freebies, I said, “There’s the evidence. My Instagram account is totally taking off, and it’s all because I followed her advice.” Desperate to prove my point, I whipped out my phone and showed her my Instagram profile. “See for yourself. Over twenty-five thousand followers.”
Mari took my phone and studied my feed before casually flicking her thumb through my followers list. Then she handed it back to me and said, with an air of disgust, “They’re all fake.”
“What?” The air was suddenly sucked out of my lungs, but I tried very hard not to flinch. Of course I knew what she was talking about. The real question was, how did she know they were fake?
“They’re all bots, Bree. It’s obvious. Half of them have the same stupid profile photo.” The smug sense of superiority on Mari’s face made me feel like a total failure. “You think this kind of thing doesn’t exist in the YouTube world? For twenty bucks, you can get a thousand subscribers. No savvy person actually does it, though, because it’s completely fraudulent and destroys your credibility. Was this one of Demi DiPalma’s brilliant ideas?”
“No, it was Natasha’s idea.”
“Wait, Natasha believes in this shit?” She furrowed her brow. “I’m surprised. She’s so levelheaded.”
“Yes, she’s levelheaded, and yes, she believes in it because it’s not fraudulent. It’s a common practice that a lot of influencers use. A way to kick-start my career and—”
“Your career?” Mari laughed. “Bree, this is not a career. This is a scam.”
“Everything’s a scam to you.”
“No, only scams are scams to me, and what you’re doing is a scam. Not to mention, it’s self-absorbed and shallow and fake. You’re a better person than this. You could be pursuing something totally worthwhile—helping people in need, creating works of art, contributing to the world in some meaningful way—and instead, you choose to devote your time to shilling a bunch of crap to people who probably can’t even afford it. Crap you don’t even use yourself.” She kicked my tote bag for emphasis, sending one of the FRANGELICO shoes rolling off into the sand.
She had a point. I would never wear these hideous shoes, so why was I trying to convince someone else to?
The sad fact is, I was doing it for the likes. I wanted the attention, the praise, the validation from someone—anyone, even random strangers on the internet. I wanted people to tell me I looked amazing, gorgeous, anything other than mediocre. I didn’t even care if it was a lie, or if it was coming from a bot that was preprogrammed to spit out canned compliments on a regular schedule.
How pathetic.
On the other hand, who was Mari to judge me for my choices? After all, it’s not like she devoted her life to feeding the homeless or saving the planet. She was trying to be a social media star, too.
A hot, molten anger built up in my chest until it erupted like a volcano over my tongue. “What are you doing that’s so important and meaningful, then? You record yourself complaining and you upload it to YouTube. How is that a worthwhile pursuit?”
For a moment, she looked gutted, as if I’d plunged a dagger into the pit of her stomach. Then the hurt vanished and was immediately replaced with flared-nostril fury.
“I’m making people laugh,” she said. “Real, actual people. Not bots I paid for in bulk. I’m giving them a piece of myself—a true, authentic piece of myself—and I’m not lying to them about who I am or what I do or what I like or don’t like. And yeah, not everyone laughs. The comments I get aren’t all fawning and flattering like yours are. But at least they’re real.”
As Mari turned her back on me and began to walk away, I had the sudden urge to lunge at her, wrap my arms around her waist, beg for her forgiveness. What I’d said was callous and hurtful, something she didn’t deserve, especially not after all the hard work she’d put into her comedy over the years. I’d lashed out because I was feeling defensive. And I was feeling defensive because everything she said to me was true.
I didn’t want to be an Instagram influencer. I wanted the influencer lifestyle—at least, the lifestyle as it was portrayed in the typical influencer feed. But it was all a carefully curated narrative. The lifestyle I coveted was a lie.
Before I could find my voice, Mari was already gone, walking briskly up the ramp toward Ocean Boulevard. In all our years of friendship, we’d never had a fight this bad, where one of us stormed off in anger. I needed to apologize to her, to make this right. But I’d wait until we both cooled off, and I could speak without shame strangling my vocal chords.
The sun was just disappearing beyond the horizon now. I stood still, staring at it, trying not to blink, anxious to catch a glimpse of the elusive green flash. Maybe if I wished hard enough, if I believed with all my heart, if I tuned my attention to the exact right frequency, then the universe would deliver it to me.
I watched until the last speck of light was extinguished, and the sky was nothing but an endless dusky blue expanse. No green flash. Time to pack it up and go home.
With my tote bag full of freebies hanging off of one arm and the plastic bag containing Rob’s drone slung over the other, I plodded up the beach toward the street, feeling sorry for myself. Then I passed by the homeless couple and felt stupid for wallowing in self-pity. No matter how bad I had it, at least I still had my apartment. It may have been shady and illegal and possibly in imminent risk of an electrical fire, but it was a roof over my head. A safe space with a bed and a minifridge and a box full of memories of my mom.
The couple propped a sign against their legs: Anything Helps. I didn’t have any spare change or extra food to give them. But I did have all the stuff in these two bags.
I approached them with a smile on my face and placed the bags on the sand in front of them. “This is for you guys.”
They looked at each other, then one of them peered inside the tote bag. She removed the bottle of kombucha and read the label out loud. “‘Detox your adrenals.’”
“It’s a health drink,” I said. “At least, I think it is.”
At the same time, her partner opened the plastic bag and removed the drone, turning it over in his hands. “What is this?”
“A camera drone.” When he squinted in confusion, I added, “It works, I just don’t need it anymore. I figured maybe you guys could sell it or something...”
As the words came out, I winced at my privilege. It was so easy for me to post something on Craigslist or eBay without a second thought. My ubiquitous internet access and permanent address were something I took for granted. I’d thought I was doing a good deed here, but were these two bags of crap actually going to help them, or was I simply adding to their already immense burden?
“I’m sorry,” I said. “If you don’t want this stuff, I can take it back. I didn’t mean to give you a bunch of useless things.”
“No,” she said, still rooting around in the tote bag. “This is great. Thank you. We’ll find a way to sell everything.” She paused, then pulled out the shoes, inspecting them with a grimace. “Except maybe these.”
“They’re ugly, I know.”
“Very.”
Despite having shed two bags and ten pounds’ worth of stuff, I left the beach feelin
g heavier than before. It took an enormous amount of effort just to press the crosswalk button at the corner of Mission Boulevard, where I waited for the traffic to come to a stop.
“Bree?”
A tall, lanky guy was suddenly standing beside me. He gave me this goofy smile, and when I didn’t immediately say hi, he pointed at his chest, like I should already know who he was. Granted, he did look vaguely familiar, but so did half the people in Pacific Beach.
“It’s Colton,” he said. “From Doobie Den.”
Ah, Doobie Den. Rob’s old dispensary. I hadn’t spent much time there—I’d tried to avoid visiting him on the job. Sometimes it couldn’t be helped, though. Like whenever he forgot his wallet, which was disturbingly frequently.
Now that I had context, I recognized Colton. He was the guy who was always standing slack-jawed behind the glass case of pipes and bowls. Frankly, I was surprised he knew my name.
“Hi,” I said.
“How’s Rob?” Clearly, Colton hadn’t gotten the memo.
“I wouldn’t know. He’s in Peru.”
“Nah, man. He came back a while ago.” He stood there, eyes glazed over, scratching his temple like it hurt him to think.
“No, he’s still very much out of the country.”
Colton shook his head. “Nah, he’s in LA or something. I saw it on Instagram.”
This guy had no idea what he was talking about. Rob had deleted his Instagram before going to the Amazon, as part of the Divine Mother Shakti’s technology ban. Still, he took his phone out of his back pocket to scroll through it, presumably looking for photographic evidence that Rob was, indeed, in Los Angeles. Annoyed as I was, it was also kind of funny to see the confusion on Colton’s face as he searched for an account that no longer existed.
“Yeah, here he is.”
He held his phone out so I could see the screen, which was tiled with square photographs of Rob. Except it was a better version of Rob than I’d known. This Rob had gotten a haircut and shaved off that scraggly chinstrap beard he’d been sporting for the past two years. His right arm was sleeved in brand-new tattoos, and he posed in front of iconic LA landmarks, like the Capitol Records Building and the Hollywood sign, gazing off into the distance, straining to appear introspective.
She's Faking It Page 15