Paparrazzi swarm around her, she feels crushed beaten back against a sea of flashing lights and questions she doesn’t want answers to. “Belle- where’s Christian? Trouble in paradise?” She’s been shaking her head for months, he’s just busy and everything is fine. “Belle any truth to rumors the wedding has been pushed back?” She’s forced to lie and say things are right on team, but in truth they haven’t sent out their save the dates because he keeps pushing the date around. “Belle how do you feel about striptease?” And then there’s the music video he starred in with some Euro-pop star grinding on him and undressing him. She assures everyone it’s jus apart of the industry.
It’s a regular occurrence now, answering questions about her love life being in shambles and combatting rumors of an affair again. She says his name ten times to every one she says her own. Ever since he started filming that movie in Prague, the one that led him to the sultry euro-pop star and subsequently away from her. She’s alone in her manhattan apartment for the night, tossing her phone aside-she doesn’t bother “checking in” with him as it’s pointless. He’s probably out enjoying his life and she’s stuck at home.
Her assistant has taken to making sure her liquor supplies are meticulously stocked.
Lou was gone too, away for some spy flick yet she and Ian were managing just fine. She couldn’t confide in either of them about her newfound loneliness, about the way Christian just didn’t seem to care anymore or about how she was planning a wedding on her own. Even Julian seems to be busy now, much too busy to spend time with her. Not that she’s any fun anymore or at least that’s how he saw it. She tried visiting him on set but she was more of a burden then anything, it was his first film and it was natural for him to be consumed with it. Her friends assure her, he loves her-he’s never loved anyone more, he would never do anything to hurt her. What’s worse then being ignored by everyone she’d come to trust? The guilt. How can she impose on the happiness of Ian and Lou? How can she burden Julian with her sadness and insecurities? How can she take away from Christian’s success?
When he visits failed, she’d tried skype. It went as spectacularly as you would expect.
She sheds her designer dress, full of self-loathing and pity. He didn’t even care about the rumors, about how many times she lied and told him it was fine if they pushed back the wedding-what’s a few more months, about the spectacular mess he was leaving her to lie and clean up with. As soon as she called him or told him things were fine he vanished again. She felt like she was clinging to something that wasn’t there. She strides over to the kitchen ignoring the folders of work that her assistant left, insisting that maybe if she was busy it wouldn’t hurt so bad. Even her assistant knew she’d been abandoned, how fucking pathetic. She’s in the kitchen, wearing fancy lingerie for no one and fixing herself a glass of whisky.
She wanders into her bathroom, removing her makeup and kicking off her high heels. She doesn’t even feel like cleaning up her own messes anymore.
That’s when she sees it. She doesn’t know where it came from, maybe her hair stylist forgot it. She downs the whisky, letting it burn her throat raw as she gazes at the little box. She picks up her phone, toying with a dangerous idea. He always loved her blonde hair, everyone always loved her blonde hair but she was sick of being what everyone wanted her to be. She was sick of planning a wedding by herself having it pushed back. She was sick of clinging to a relationship where it was obvious that once more she cared more. She was sick of friends who abandoned her. She was sick of her life.
It’s 2 am when the selfie drops on instagram, some people will claim it breaks twitter if not the internet while most of the world is asleep. The smiling blonde Belle Cavendish is gone, in her place is an inky haired vixen. Black hair frames her sharp blue eyes as she stares directly into the camera with a simply caption beneath it reading, “New hair, who’s this?”
pixelskylines
stormborns
