The Starlet and the Dealer

How she coped you might ask? She mostly just managed to dissociate and figuratively become her character Gatsby Garcia and just live vicariously through her. No prom no problem she had everyone one-upped her TV prom was simply her prom. Unfortunately, though her off set her antics both horrified her bosses and angered her co-stars so there was this tension that plagued the set. The show-runners were growing progressively annoyed with her and were sort of looking for an out for her character. Enter, the cancer plot. It was the only time she thought her life was in jeopardy and . . . you know what? It was. For once there was nothing she really could have done.

To fans of course she was the crown jewel of the show. Gatsby was the ideal, queen bee and prom queen, homecoming queen and resident bitch; both liked and hated universally and now her character has cancer. Not everyone loved Miss Garcia, some fans who have grown out of her type out hate on fan blogs that maybe she should just die already, that she serves no purpose anymore.

She pretends not to be hurt by it. She's an actress after all, so she finds it easy to mask defeat.

However she's been in talks with the show runners and writers begging that she can't stand to see her character get the ax. The light at the end of the tunnel was that there was a writer who tended to believe in her though, his name was Curtis. He was twenty-three and sort of new to the season, he's been pretty central and instrumental to her characters' redemption through her cancer the writing team was already well into the developmental stages of the plot, Curtis worked his way in to make it so that people would be emotionally positive toward the ice queen and sort of therefore melt her heart. The writers were sold on the idea but no one knew if there would be a future for Garcia after it goes through the stages, how long could they milk the plot line? Only time would tell. Time was only ticking away. She was beginning to lose what little hope she already had, it was time to reach out, and her naïvety would only be proven to show.

With Curtis, the writer team and show runners wanted him fresh out of college they took somewhat of a shine to him when he sent in this fan script. Also they believed that he could write good teenagers because the age difference is pretty narrow. Since he has sort of spearheaded into making the language more believable she finds the things she's been saying more true and proper to situations instead of robotic and tried and true saccharine sweet yet typical mean girl. Zoe being quite shallow cloud opinion but truthfully he wasn't what she'd call attractive. In fact she read in Girltrash most teenagers based their liking to a member of the opposite sex on their looks and then whatever comes out of their mouth. Zoe knew she had to play the game to keep in good graces; she even stopped bullying her cast mates who sort of ignore her anyway. Always to her elders respectful and professional but word about set was that Curtis had been known to be somewhat inappropriate and constantly attempting pushing the envelope in all aspects of his work. Racy and risqué plotlines? Check. Pushing that scantily clad envelope in the costuming department? Double check. She snickers at the thought of being a sexy cancer patient but she would do anything to trade the hospital gown for a pair of glitzy high heels.

In front of superiors and supervisors on set he acted like some sort of gracious angel who was thankful for them taking out a limb on him. He had this side of him where he wasn't so different from her at all.

He was chubby, had facial hair, a kinky curly mess of hair and he always wore this ugly baseball hat of some obscure band logo on it. She always saw the irony of it. Probably all his conquests in the romantic realm were imaginary, probably on the rich-tor scale about a five in a scale of twenty at best. Probably doesn't have a girlfriend and might just live in his mother's basement playing World of Warcraft and again he was a fan of the show. He liked her character before and he liked her predecessor who he grew up with, Garcia's oldest sister that's what propelled him to want to be a writer on the show. His dream came true and her dream was rapidly slipping away. Since his promotion and big break, he has some sort of bearing over who stays and who goes who gets a good plot and who winds up with the c and d forgotten plots. Rivas has been in the show since she was basically a fetus. The long running drama has been her entire life literally and figuratively.

Filming wrapped for the day she was dressed in her street-clothes again and she saw him walk by her dressing room. He did that sometimes, sometimes she wonders if he wants to catch her half-nude or something which she wouldn't put past 's familiar with the rumor mill even though her co-stars sort of ostracize her it's not like she's completely deaf to the grape fine of happenings, she's heard stories of him walking in by "accident" but she was smart to shut the door. She usually would see him walk by her dressing room though once her door opened back up and she'd ask if he could go to the catering van and fetch her a cup of coffee.

Since he was one of the few people she had seen as an ally she went to him in confidence exclaiming, "Curtis, wait!"

He whipped his head around in what seemed to be instantaneously he compassionately offered her a friendly smile, "Zoe, what do you need?"

"Soy late?" She offered before shaking her head, nervously she bit her bottom lip before replying, "I'm kidding. I just want to know if you guys made a decision yet about me." She could hear that desperate tone fleeting from her inner voice but God knows what it sounds like to him.

It's not the tone that sounds like the first sign of an illness, or maybe it is. Illness, weakness to Zoe is illness.

Perhaps the lack of control of her life whatever have you, she felt pathetic all over, inside and out coursing through her veins. The set was near empty around this time, there were small amounts of people in the hall so the conversation was quiet.

"Good, because I don't have the cash now anyway." He offered this nervous chuckle he liked to do, it's like he caught himself flirting with danger, "It's fine though, I'm almost sure of it but say, could you drop by place around ten? You know if it's not too late. I think I have some ideas for the enrichment of your character."

The doe-eyed brunette hesitated, but then relented. At this rate she was desperate she sounded less than enthused, "Curtis, what do you need?"

He thought for a moment and then smirked, cool and calculated, "I just have some ideas that I'd like to run by you, between you and me."

He gave her the creeps in that moment both there and in retrospect. Zoe nodded in agreement, agreeing to meet with him, "Sure."

Sure she had a curfew but it was pretty damn easy to sneak out of the house she and her mother shared.

It wasn't the first time they met at his place; alone that is. Often times, Curtis threw small gatherings with the cast after a big block of episodes or season finales. It was normal on-set behavior. No one big like the execs ever questioned it. To be blunt there weren't rules to really break in television.

It's a strange land where all the actors and actresses are expected to have tension and drama on-screen but just keep your personal junk at the door but since Zoe had neither it made it hard for her to do so. She struggled with that judgment of separation and visiting people off set to talk about onset stuff was almost customary like getting a wound looked at in a hospital. It was just the way Westdrive and it's writing and acting team rolled. It was merely the first time she had met Curtis alone. He had these unconventional ways of working with the cast, developing plots and aiding in the direction of the character, quasi-stepping on the directors toes a bit but also informing of the intention of the script he wrote. He wanted to keep the vision alive. His vision.

This just seemed different to her though. When Curtis stepped away he didn't look back. She took one last look at herself in the mirror, adjusted her hair before taking her tote bag to go on home. Even drug abuse wasn't that big of a deal, alcoholic antics were brushed under the rug but an unruly group of cast members that just couldn't get along was apparently somehow a bigger problem and of course frowned upon.

At this rate she was persona non grata. She supposed it wasn't too late at least Curtis was seemingly on her side.