The sun was shining, the birds were singing, and today I was going to talk to Abby again. It’s been so long. I felt like a man that hadn’t had a drop of water but was close to a giant, and refreshing, pool of drinkable water. I was ready to dip my mouth.

My job got in the way of course. I had to pick up Leslie today and bring her to the agency. Strangely she didn’t greet me with her usual silent face, instead, she gave me a small smile as I picked her up, albeit a silent smile.

When we got to her office I looked at my watch. It was time.

“Leslie let's celebrate this new day with something special. How about I get you a delicious makatoma bread from a bakery nearby? I heard it was good.”

“No thanks, I’m feeling full right now.”

“I would like to give it to you as a sign of my appreciation it's not every day that I’ll get promoted.”

“Thanks for the thought, but I can’t eat right now.”

“Come on…”

she scowled at me. “I don’t want to eat so stop asking. It’s getting annoying. I promoted you to get me new scripts, so when will you get me something? Are you going to stand around all day?”

“Despite having the day off on Friday, yes! I found you the perfect script.” I pulled out the script I got from that girl in Emily's group. I didn’t read it, I didn’t even look at the title. But it should be long enough for me to escape for an hour or so.

“Hmmm…’Loneliness’? The title…sounds horrible.”

“It’s a good script, I think you would be perfect for..” I moved the script to the character list and pointed at a random female name on the list. “Her.”

“Abigail? A side character? She isn’t even important enough to be under the main characters...”

“I know, but her character spoke to me. When I read through it I felt a…you vibe. Like it would bring out your qualities as an actress perfectly. But… maybe you don’t trust me…. read through the entire script and you’ll understand.”

She looked at me warily. “If I end up in a role that wastes my time again…you’re going to get it.” Her wariness turned to haughtiness as she leaned back on her chair. “Maybe we would even roll back that promotion.”

“I know this character will make you shine, I’ll bet it all to see you play her. You have to read the entire script if you don’t believe me, no skimming or skipping.”

“…” she put on her sunglasses and began on page one while I sneaked out.

Ha. Did she think more responsibilities were something I wanted? I didn’t even want the promotion!

I laughed all the way to the outside of the agency where I put on the face that Abby would see as I walked by, a calm and cool face.

I focused in front of me, when I noticed, through the side of my left eye, two women walking past me.

“Jake?”

“Emily?” I reflexively replied. “And where’s Abby!?”

“S-she wasn’t here…”

“Wh-what do you mean? Did you look everywhere? Did she walk past you? You do know what she looks like?!”

“I’m s-sorry she must have decided not to come by today…”

I stared at her. I stared until I knew she felt ashamed. Then I started to walk away disappointed, sad, and angry. Emily grabbed me from behind before I could take a step away. “Hey, I’m sorry! But” she whispered “What about the Clare issue?”

“Clare?” Her eyes searched my face for an answer. I wanted to hit her. “We kidnap her.”

“Huh?”

“She doesn’t respect you, we have to make sure that she will never do this to you again-”

“But…”

“We go to the dorms, kidnap, and scare her a little. She will think that you are someone not to mess with, and she will never try to get with Daniel again because she will wonder what you’ll be willing to do for him.”

“No…we can’t…”

“Why are you so against my ideas?” She should do what I say. “Follow what I have to tell you and you can the life you want with this guy. No more Clare. you don’t want that?”

“Yea, but I don’t…I mean it's not like kidnapping will help anything, I don’t know.”

“You tried to talk with her and she treated you like trash. Like a piece of dirt, she could kick and stomp her shoes on. Do you want to keep being this pathetic? She treated you like you don’t matter because you are willing to take it all without doing anything against her. You’re angry? So what! You don’t have anything to threaten her with.”

“No…it’s- I-I don’t think it would be good to do that.“

“We won’t hurt her, we’ll teach her a lesson. A very scary lesson. After which we take her back home, delete the photos, and poof everything is done.”

“We can’t…” her tone questioned itself like she already agreed with me. The only thing against the plan was her conscious.

“Don’t think.” I gripped her shoulders. “Let me guide you through this, this is all my responsibility. You don’t have to think of anything, listen to what I say and we can be over and done with this mess.”

“...”

“It's to scare her Emily, nothing will happen.”

Did we have to kidnap her? The answer to that can be found in the bottom of the ditch where Emily should have been buried when I first met her. It would be as easy to go into their dorm, search for the phone, and destroy it. But Emily had caused enough problems for me already, she’ll kidnap Clare, try to scare her, Clare would go to the cops, and then she will be gone from my life. Simple.

“You can get the guy, you can continue your idol career, and I…I can finally talk to Abby without any interruptions. Do you get it?”

“Yea, you’re right.”

“I have some rope and chloroform at my house. Somewhere. I’ll get them later then I’ll kidnap her to a remote warehouse at the edge of the city.”

“And what do I do?”

“You…you will be the face of this entire thing. You don’t want her to think that you got any help from anybody, you want her to think that you went insane, crazy, and finally snapped after she betrayed you. You have to be angry, you have to be scary, you have to make her regret ever messing with you.”

She started to bite her fingers. “I should have done something, said something, back in the park…maybe she would have deleted it, if I was a little more forceful, maybe she would have left Daniel alone.”

“Channel it, Emily. Remember that you will be the face of this entire thing, and you will be the person she has to be scared of.”

“I’ll try my hardest.” She took a second. “I…thank you. I’m a burden to the people around me. Even with all these people looking up to me, all of them praising me, they aren’t interested in me. I know you are doing this for something too, and then you’ll probably go back to ignoring me, but I hope that we can still be friends after this.”

What an idiot. Kidnapping? She’ll go to jail and never be seen again. I can only hope that she goes away long enough that she wouldn’t ever be able to get back at me.

I walked back to Leslie's room without any bread. She didn’t deserve it. When I walked in she threw the script with a thwack against the floor.

“This is shit, it's web drama quality writing! And you're telling me to play a character that's a hobbled mess! Too scared to do anything in life and eventually fades away after 4 episodes when the writers forget about her?! Are you kidding me?!”

“Did you read it?”

“I read it twice. Am I supposed to be like this shitty character? Are you slacking off again?”

“Trust me, Leslie, the role will represent a new you that I think will really help you. I know that role is perfect for you! I had never seen you more clearly than when reading that character.”

“But it's everything that I don’t want in a show!”

“I know.”

“It's the exact type of show that idiot manager of yours would have recommended me and I would have rejected.”

“I know but I do think it's good. If you don’t believe me that's fine, but you hired me to get you shows that would help you, that would express you better. This is the show.”

She seemed conflicted “How so? Explain.”

I picked up the manuscript. “This girl. She exhibits your character of strength. She goes through struggles in her everyday life that I feel like you would too, are you not also struggling right now? Then she, as a side character, is perfect for you to shine. You haven’t had a role as the main lead yet because nobody has had the chance to see you the way I see you. This character will be it for you. She will reveal to the world the true glory of Leslie, your true aura.”

She looked at the manuscript. “….”

She had a face on her that she wanted to believe. It was all bullshit I came up with and it even sounded like complete nonsense to me. But she was considering it. “Come on. Try to audition for it. If you don’t believe me then I will say it's my fault and I’ll receive whatever punishment you want, even if that means going back to being a temp.”

She broke her stare and looked at me. “Don’t worry, I won’t do something like that. Give it to me. I’m only doing this because you’re obsessed with me, I don’t know, maybe you see something I don’t…”

In actuality I don’t see anything you vile monster, I want to go back to having as little responsibility as possible. “Thank you.”

“Now, come on, call the director and tell him to set up an audition.”

“Right away~!”