Everyone cheers as I cross the stage. My calves are already aching, but I push through with my most gorgeous smile, holding the little orange envelope in my hands.
Under the hot, bright lights, I play my part. Create a little suspense, even though I’m trying to find Mom in the rows of VIP spectators. I read from the teleprompter, then open the envelope, biting my lip, and call out the winner for TV Drama of the Year. The cast, writers, and producers explode with excitement, and I clap enthusiastically for a show I’ve never watched. As they come onstage, I gracefully step aside and let them have their moment.
Then I hug them, all these people I’ve never met, like we’re longtime friends, like everyone here is pals. One of the women links an arm through mine while a writer squeezes in his two cents before the music starts playing him off. I lean into her like she’s my favorite person in the world, but I don’t even know her name.
The front row, before the VIP section of the crowd starts, is actually reserved for the cameras. A beehive of photographers take a thousand pictures without drawing any attention to themselves, while suspended cameras film the event. We all know not to glance at the cameras. We all know we’re just posing.
When the lights go down and a new musical number signals the commercial break between awards, Bobbi comes to take me back to my dressing room, and I realize I don’t feel so magical anymore. Exhausted, maybe.
Bobbi links her arm with mine. “Wasn’t that wonderful?”
“Yes, it was,” I reply without thinking, feigning enthusiasm I’m not feeling.
Weird.
She stops me before we reach my dressing room and takes my hands. “Five minutes, okay? You have five minutes to go over your thank-you speech, and then, if—I mean when you win, Gemma Santiago is ‘surprising’ you by coming backstage to get you—”
I start. “Gemma Santiago? She’s giving the award?” Bobbi nods, and there’s a spark of joy in me that I can’t control. “Are you kidding me? I’ve sung her songs in the shower all my life. I’ve always wanted to— I’ve never met her. I really wanted to, but…but it never happened. She’s the one—?”
“Be in your dressing room, doing something cute,” Bobbi advises. She’s about to turn and go but she stops herself. “And tell Trent to get lost. He shouldn’t be there if they come for you. This moment is yours.”
I nod.
But I remain standing, feeling a little off.
While the commercial break music reverberates backstage, my mind swirls: my boyfriend, talking to the hottest new Angel; my inhaler in the purse that’s in my dressing room. Frivolous, superficial. Gemma Santiago?
My stomach churns.
Trent appears in the corridor and starts my way.
“Natalie. Whoa. I had forgotten how hot you look tonight.”
I give him a small smile. Everything’s going to be fine. I’m probably just nervous.
“Thanks. You look good, too. Who are you wearing?” I ask, widening my eyes as though I’m interviewing him on the red carpet, and he gives me an awkward laugh.
“Yeah.” He nods for a moment, then, as if he’s remembered it now, says, “Listen, can we talk real quick?”
His slight frown, the way his hands are tucked into the pockets of his pants…I step closer, put my hands on his chest, and tease, “Oh, you look so serious like that. Are you going to propose or something? I’m going to have to politely decline. I’m only seventeen. Maybe in a few years, same place?”
Trent lets out a strangled laugh. He puts his hands on mine. “You’re funny.”
“I’m delightful,” I reply.
“You are. Which is why this is so hard.”
“What—?”
Trent takes my hands from his chest and holds them. I vaguely notice some light around us, but I’m too shocked to look away.
“I met someone else. You remember Reese, right? We’ve been DMing for a while now, and I think she’s the real thing.”
Reese.
My jaw drops. I hear someone call my name, but I just put my hand up. The eight-year-old in me is ready to fight. What I want, like I’ve never wanted anything, is to punch Trent in his perfect face.
“This is important, babe,” he says, his frown deepening. “I’m telling you I think I’ve fallen in love. Aren’t you supposed to be happy for me?”
I can’t take it. I can’t.
“You said you loved me, you asshole!” I yell in his face, my hand hitting his chest. He takes a step back.
“Well, I did! But things change,” he answers, all the while sounding like the nice guy everyone thinks he is. A perfect gentleman.
A perfect jerk.
“These past eight months have been really good,” he continues with a stupid fake smile. “We’ve been through a lot. Nominated best couple on Instagram and trended how many times?” Trent puts a hand on my arm, and I yank it back. “I’ve lost count!”
“This isn’t happening.” I say and shut my eyes.
If I can’t see him, he can’t see me. This is not happening. None of this is. If I keep my eyes screwed shut for long enough, I know I can be back in my living room under a blanket with a canja bowl on my lap and Mom by my side.
“I didn’t even want to come here today,” he laments. “It’s your award. I respect that. But why should I have to come to events that don’t involve me in any way, just because of you? Reese would never ask that of me.”
I get on my tiptoes, so I’m right in his face, speaking between gritted teeth. “Did you wait until my moment to make me feel like trash before I’m told I’m a queen? Screw you, Nicholson!”
My voice is high-pitched and breaking.
I feel the tears coming, and I can’t stop the words pouring out of my mouth.
“You’re supposed to be a supportive boyfriend who is not breaking up with me minutes before my award, you self-centered, egocentric son of a—”
“Honey!” Bobbi yells, exasperated but firm.
I take a step back.
Oh.
My.
God.
The camera crew is here. Gemma Santiago, a Latina queen who’s made history for the past decade, is here. With her vibrant golden dress, her signature full red lips, and the most awkward expression I’ve ever seen.
She’s still holding the envelope, the one that probably has my name in it.
It’s golden, too.
Bobbi looks like she’s arrived in a rush. Everyone seems flustered. The camera operator mouths an apology, but they don’t stop streaming.
“Oh no,” I murmur, but the tears are coming, and I can’t stop them. “Oh no.”
It’s the moment I’ve been dreaming of. And it’s a complete mess.
Bobbi turns to the camera operator again. “Can’t you stop filming?!”
He shakes his head. “It’s live.”
Trent smiles at the camera and waves. I feel my makeup melting from sweat and tears.
Bobbi comes into the frame, and as she puts an arm protectively around me, she whispers in my ear, “I told you to be in your dressing room. They were coming to get you. Didn’t you realize the commercial break was over?”
I feel the warm tears rolling down my cheeks. Yes, that’s definitely going to leave a trail. I wipe them away with the back of my hands, ignoring Bobbi and Trent, who’s still next to me.
I square my shoulders and turn to the camera, stepping in front of my ex-boyfriend.
“Okay, let’s do this.”
My friends will be here any minute, but while I wait, it’s just me and the internet.
At least my dream mentor, Gemma Santiago, hasn’t tweeted about me or reposted one of the memes, because it feels like, in this past week, everyone else has.
I’ve buried myself under a fortress of duvets. Mom would hate to see that the AC is
on during an early-September California day—even when California is cold, it isn’t exactly cold—but I’m purposely making my room ridiculously icy. This is the life I’m choosing to live right now, under the covers.
I was watching the fourth season of Make Me a Royal, but now it’s background noise. Gretta, the commoner who’s in love with the prince, is about to make him lose his crown for the sake of their love. “Losers!” I yell at the TV. I use my phone to pause the show.
And, for the millionth time this morning, I open Instagram and click the tagged pictures.
A screen-size me is yelling in a loop: “Did you wait until my moment to make me feel like trash before I’m told I’m a queen?”
Again and again and again.
I sigh and start scrolling. So many memes with that scene alone.
One caption is me when mom says i can’t go to a bts concert. Another caption reads, me when a professor doesn’t give me an a.
I scroll down fast until the thumbnail changes. I pause and let it play. It’s me staring at the camera with wide eyes and melted dark makeup. “Oh no,” I say in the video, and then it becomes a remix of me saying it over and over and over again. Most of the videos are imported from TikTok. The one time I opened TikTok, I saw people acting out the scene with my music playing, people dancing to my speech, and it…wasn’t great.
“Ugh,” I groan, shoving my phone into the blanket as if, just like that, everything will go away.
Mom barges in without knocking. She starts with “Your friends—” but stops, frowns, looks up at the AC disapprovingly, then apparently chooses her battle and walks to the bed. “Nati, filha.”
“Natalie,” I correct her.
A knee-jerk reaction that shouldn’t have happened, because now all sympathy is gone from her round hazel eyes, and she’s glaring at me. “Your name is Natalia,” she says, with a strong Brazilian accent. “Na-ta-li-a,” she repeats. “And Nati is a loving nickname. Everyone named Natalia has that nickname.”
Everyone Brazilian, living in Brazil. But I don’t say that.
“Natalie’s a stage name,” I offer. One that I insist all my friends call me, too.
Mom seems to accept that for now. She lies down and gestures for me to do the same. I resist for about a millisecond before I give up on seeming tough, and lie down as well, letting Mom cuddle me. Back when we lived in Brazil in Grandma’s house, we shared a room and used to cuddle every night. She would kiss my head, and we would talk quietly about how our day had been. Usually, it was my favorite time of the day.
When Mom worked on the remodel of the National Library in Rio de Janeiro, she created a futuristic design inspired by Oscar Niemeyer that attracted attention from international architecture firms. I was eight at the time. She was offered jobs in Los Angeles, Boston, Singapore, and Milan. Even though she didn’t speak fluent English at the time, she signed with the firm in Los Angeles. The one with the best career plan and highest salary.
Which also turned out to be the hub of the entertainment industry.
With the security of Mom’s new job came mine. I was scouted in a talent show at my arts school in LA, and then I signed with Bobbi, the best agent ever, who brought in a wonderful marketing and PR team. Now I have a gold and a platinum album and two world tours behind me.
And the internet doesn’t care about any of that, because I’m the new hottest meme.
“You have to forget that night,” Mom murmurs, holding me close. I let her hold me and sigh softly. For a second I’m surprised she’s read my mind, then I realize my silence is probably pretty obvious. “For a little bit, if anything.”
Just above a whisper, I confess, “I’m afraid, Mami…”
She doesn’t ask why. With her mom powers, she knows. “They’ll forget about it eventually. You’ve earned their respect.”
I close my eyes and allow myself to feel safe, even if I don’t believe her.
“I came in to say your friends texted me that they’ll be a little late because they stopped at a bakery.” She pauses. “Maybe that part was a surprise, actually. Anyway, they texted me because they said your phone was probably turned off. Is it?”
I don’t respond.
She sighs and kisses the top of my head, just like when I was a little kid.
* * *
Padma—DJ Lotus—and Brenda enter my room without any knocking, either, because no one respects my privacy, be it Mom or my friends. But Brenda is bringing sprinkled doughnuts, my favorite, and Padma is carrying a bag of chips, so I don’t comment on that.
“I love sprinkles,” I murmur, sitting up.
Padma is the coolest person I’ve met since becoming famous. Brenda is my only non-famous friend who stayed in my tiny circle because she loved me and not because she wanted things. Along the way, they became girlfriends. They’re super cute together. Even though I feel down about this whole Trent mess, it makes me happy to see them so happy.
“Girl, you love us. You don’t get to say you love sprinkles before you say you love us,” Padma says with a frown as she sits by my side.
Brenda nods, but shoves the box of doughnuts my way, anyway. “OMG, is this Make Me a Royal? I haven’t watched the new season yet. Are Gretta and Timothy together?” She grabs my phone to unpause it.
I yank it back from her hands and force-close Netflix. “Gretta and Timothy are losers,” I say. She glares at me, and Padma chuckles, getting under the blanket with me.
“It’s Antarctica in here. Where are the penguins?” Padma scrunches her nose.
Brenda reluctantly gets under the blankets on my other side. She opens the doughnut box and unceremoniously grabs herself one.
“Making fun of me on the internet.” I shrug.
They exchange a look. I roll my eyes and rest my head on Padma’s shoulder. She has a pixie cut, so her hair doesn’t bother me when I want to cuddle—Brenda’s long, light hair always ends up getting in my mouth, even when we hug.
Brenda is the only other Brazilian I know in the States. We met in school my first year here, when I was eight and she was nine, and though her family’s originally from Recife and mine from São Paulo, it was easy to bond over the fact that no American can properly pronounce Recife or São Paulo.
I met Padma way later, only last year, before I went on my most recent world tour. My publicist connected us to make some music, and we ended up talking in the studio for hours about growing up with reruns of children shows from a decade ago: mine from Brazil, hers from Pakistan. It made our vocabulary in our native tongues a little limited now that we’re teenagers. I can’t speak about politics or global warming in Portuguese, but you’d be surprised how many ways I can say that the kitten is fluffy and sweet.
Padma leans back and makes a funny face. “Your hair smells bad, Natalie.”
I take a doughnut from the box on Brenda’s lap. “Thanks, friend. You’re so supportive.”
“Padma has a point, though,” Brenda tells me. “I know what happened was horrible. We brought comfort food. We love you. We hate Trent. But you have to get back to your routine. And do things like, uh, shower.” She makes a face.
Padma runs her hands through her short hair. Her dark brown fingers shimmer with several silver rings, and it looks beyond cool. If I tried that, I’d probably seem like I was trying too hard. Everything with her is effortless. It makes me want to hug her even as she’s talking. “Okay, spill. How are you feeling?”
“I just hate everything right now,” I say. “There are memes of everything. My face is everywhere. I thought I could write my suffering into a song, but apparently I can’t—” I gesture to my writing pad on the side table. Its blank pages mock me.
“Did you uninstall Twitter and Insta like you promised Bobbi?” Brenda asks, and before I can respond, she grabs my phone. She knows the password—Mom’s birthdate—and when she unlocks
it, she groans and shows the screen to Padma.
Padma snorts. “You’re using the web version of Instagram? You have got to stop.” She takes the bag of chips and shoves it in my general direction.
I take the bag and cram chips in my mouth. “It’s so humiliating,” I say around a mouthful. Brenda shakes her head, probably closing the tabs. “And Trent hasn’t called.”
“Of course he hasn’t called. He’s a dick,” Brenda says, more to herself than me, based on how her eyes are still on my phone. “You can’t expect him to call. He won’t.”
I look down. “But I miss him.”
Padma touches my shoulder. “Do you, though?”
Before I can answer, Brenda sighs heavily, hugging me close, a proper hug this time. “You know what we’re going to do? We’re going to watch that old show your mom is obsessed with, and we’re going to sleep over. It’s going to heal everything.”
Padma hugs my other side. I close my eyes and offer a little smile. “Yes!” She kisses my cheek.
Brenda adds, “And then you’re going to call Bobbi back, because she’s this close to breaking into my AP physics class to ask about you.”
I laugh. “Bobbi wants me to make some kind of triumphant comeback. But I’m not feeling it. My PR team is gonna stare at me like I’m a mess that can’t be fixed.”
They pull away. Padma holds me by the shoulders and looks deep into my eyes, which are probably red from crying. “You don’t need any fixing, you hear me, Natalie? That’s not it. You were in a difficult position. So what? It happens! All of our heroes have been in some sort of scandal. This is the first time where people have seen you’re real and you get pissed off. Before, all they saw was perfect little Miss America. You’ve given them realness.”
I touch her hands on my shoulders and pull them back. “I’ve given them GIF content for days.”
“Why can’t it be both?” Brenda chirps.
Padma touches my arm to bring my attention back to her.
“It happens. And it happened. And that’s okay. What has Auntie said about that?”
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