The Starlet

Cassandra was woken by the sound of the phone ringing.

Not her cell phone, but the other phone. She groaned, and pulled the bed covers over her head but it did little to deafen the shrill electronic trill. She squeezed her eyes shut tight until the **** on her ears stopped, but it was too late. The Elysian peace of sleep had been shattered and there was no returning. She groaned again as she rolled her legs onto the floor, and managed to maneuver herself into a sitting position on the side of the bed. She ran her hand across her face and through her long, messy black hair. She tried to stand up, but fell back onto the bed as her head spun, the fifth of bourbon she had last night still haunting her. She looked over at her alarm clock.

2:17 PM.

Shit.

She rocked forward and successfully got out of bed this time. She stood still for a moment, waiting for her head to stop swimming. As the room finally stabilized, she shambled to the bathroom. She grabbed a couple ibuprofen, downed them, and then shuffled off to the kitchen. It wasn't a long walk, her apartment was not large, but even that short trek felt exhausting. The afternoon sun beaming through the large kitchen windows was blinding, and she squinted her blue eyes against the light. Cassandra felt her way over to her coffee machine and started it. She found herself just staring off into space, until she realized that the coffee was ready. She had to hunt for a clean mug, cursing her bleary eyes the whole time. She finally found a Christmas themed mug, doubtless a gift once, that had been pushed all the way to the back of the cabinet. She filled the mug with straight black coffee, and took a overly large swig.

The coffee was still much too hot, and she coughed and sputtered as she scalded her tongue, but at least she finally felt somewhat alive again. The sunlight was becoming less painful as she crossed her combination kitchen/dining/living room and sank into her well-worn couch. She turned on her small TV and turned it to a local news station, more for the noise then anything else. As she sipped her coffee, and aimlessly watched the news, her quiet was once again shattered by the ringing of the phone.

Cassandra was one of those few people that still maintained a landline phone, and it was for one purpose only; so her agent could reliably contact her, but not be able to constantly harass her through her cell phone. Cassandra had been out of the industry for a while, but she was fortunate enough that she had some residuals, and every once in a while, her agent needed to get in contact with her about said residuals. Unfortunately, her agent was also not shy about “encouraging” her to get back into show business. She had absolutely zero interest in that, hence the landline.

She winced as the phone continued to ring, until finally the call went to voicemail. She sipped her coffee and waited, until, sure enough, a tiny blinking red light on the phone indicated that the caller had left a message. She slid down the couch towards the plain black presswood end table the phone sat on. A small screen on the phone displayed what calls she'd recently received, and her blue eyes widened slightly when she saw her agent had called her three times today before finally leaving the voicemail. He was pushy, but he usually wasn't that ****. Slightly curious, she started the voicemail.

“Hey Lily, it's Thomas Valenti. I was hoping we could talk about a possible opportunity for you. It's nothing that big, just a new reality dating show someone's trying to launch. I think it would be a great way for you to test the waters and maybe get back in the game. You know, just remind people you still exist. I've e-mailed you the details. Look it over and get back to me. Can't wait to hear what you think! Ciao.”

Cassandra scowled at the phone. As the message finished she promptly deleted it. She rose from the couch with a huff, and stomped off to the kitchen to drop off her now-empty mug. Hearing from her “agent” always left her in a bad mood. Thomas just couldn't seem to understand that she had no desire to “get back in the game.” She was tired of the discussion, and so she hardly ever answered when he called anymore. But that wasn't what had truly perturbed her so much this time. “Remind people you still exist,” what a disgustingly Hollywood concept to tie your “existence” to how much you were in the public eye. Just because she was no longer working didn't mean she'd just vanished from the earth. Besides, plenty of people still knew she existed! There was...

Cassandra tried to remember who she had interacted with this past weekend only to draw a blank. Her eyes widened slightly as she realized that besides the occasional food delivery driver, she hadn't talked to anyone at all in the past three days. Heck, she hadn't even left the apartment. Deflated, Cassandra pulled a cheap bottle of red wine out of the fridge, and poured herself a very full glass.

She wasn't going back. She didn't care what they offered her, she was never going back. She'd promised herself that four years ago, and it was one of the few things she still had worth holding on to. She would not go back.