Actors.
They're in the spotlight. Under the lights, they have to hide their true feelings beneath a mask. Professional actors have become experts at masking their feelings, but sometimes, they're just deceiving us.
On the outside, Liv looked happy and joyful. On the inside, she was crumbling from the pressure.
She'd never expected her, a regular teenage girl, to become famous worldwide due to her songs. Songwriting was her passion, but the fans and paparazzi drove her crazy. It was hard not to feel like she was never enough, since they'd always expect more. She wrote a record-breaking song in a month; she had to write another one in two weeks.
Life in the spotlight wasn't always like it was on the silver screen. Liv stayed up late, working on drafts and playing random tunes on her piano. Sometimes, she felt like Rose, completely falling apart and so, so, trapped. She'd get so angry and smash and throw a tantrum.
She didn't know if she was even sane.
All she could think about, was him.
Josh fell apart.
He needed to escape, find a way out.
Los Angeles was the entertainment industry of America. However, the spotlight came with pressure and bad energy.
The press had gone completely wild about the song. He didn't know what to do; since the city just held bad memories. Liv. Sabrina. Pressure. Cameras. Flashing lights. Coma.
Constant pressure. Always, always.
He hated it.
Josh envied those small-town slickers. They weren't constantly pressured and had people filming or taking photos of their every move. They weren't pressured to live, talk, and breathe songs.
Sure, he loved it, but it was all he really did.
He decided to run away.
He knew there were dangers in the great unknown. He had twenty dollars in his pocket and nothing to offer to anyone, except his kindness.
Josh was twenty-one, a young man with much left to do with his life. He wondered how other people his age that didn't live under the lights dealt with life.
He sent a note to everyone he knew and packed his bags. Soon, he'd settled in a small town up north in Washington. It was quiet and peaceful, and it was a nice hiatus from the pressure.
He still wrote some songs, some for himself, some for his family, some for the world, and some for her.
He knew he'd left his heart in LA.
But he didn't want to go back, because he knew it would be shattered once again.