Note: Your favorite Slytherin showed up on Friday for once. I'M SO HAPPY TO BE HERE POSTING, YOU DON'T EVEN KNOW. I've been hating this whole "midterms are taking over my entire life" thing that's been going on.
CHECK OUT THE ATTACHED VIDEO––IT'S A TRAILER FOR THE FAMOUX!! I'm LIVING for those Neon Demon clips. Crazy movie, but total Famoux aesthetic. Enjoy it with me!!
emeray
At the mere thought of Foster being alive, my legs suddenly buckle to life. I'm just barely able to jolt myself into action so that I don't fall to the floor, stumbling forward as graceless as a newborn animal taking its first steps. Almost instinctively, I move toward the door from which he's just exited, drawing curious stares and whispers in the process. Emeray Essence, leaving so soon? What's up with her? The headlines hit me like hail.
As I approach, I lock eyes with the bouncer.
"You saw him too?" I ask.
He hesitates, but his eyes say everything. "Miss Essence––"
"You did, didn't you?"
"I––I did see a young man . . ."
"Foster."
"Ma'am, that's impossible."
I clench my fists. He saw him too. He saw him.
"You saw him up close," I remind him. "You saw the details of his face. He was even the right height and everything."
"I saw someone, ma'am."
"But he looked––"
"There are a lot of sick people in the world," says the bouncer. "I'm sure you know that from your own choice in occupation. Whoever dressed up like that was trying to get this reaction from you."
"But he didn't just dress up––he was him."
"Miss Essence––"
"And how did he get in here anyway?"
"Huh?"
"How did he even get into Ace?" I ask. "This is a closed party. Wouldn't you have seen him when he entered?"
"Must've put on the disguise when he came inside." The bouncer tries to sound collected, but he's too shaken for me to believe him. "Look, it's confusing as hell, but he didn't hurt anybody."
"But––"
"He's off property now. Just enjoy your party, Miss Essence."
The last part escapes me; I'm already looking off at the door. It seems to come to mind for the first time, that Foster Farrand––if it's actually him––just left the club, and I'm standing here letting him go. Pushing past the bouncer, I rush through the vestibule and out onto the street.
The paparazzi is obviously confused to find me outside so soon. Camera flashes come in delayed, a refrain of questioning tumbling into my ears like a rockslide.
"Emeray Essence?"
"What happened?"
"Are you leaving?"
"Did something happen with Cartney?"
I turn back toward the door as the bulbs go off rapidly. The knob flickers in the light, mocking me with its impossibility. How can it be that this is the same door Foster came out of not three minutes ago? These cameramen have been stationed out here for the entire evening.
But they must not have see him, somehow, because all they ask of me is what I'm doing out here, not my thoughts on Foster Farrand's sudden rise from the dead.
My heart beat escalades as I glance down either side of the walkway, meeting nothing but an insistent throng of fans reaching out to me both passionate and predatorily. I reach out to them right back, smiling half-heartedly as I glance over their heads, past the cameras trying to blind me. There is absolutely no one that looks like Foster Farrand walking away from the scene. No one as tall as him, no one with his stance, no one with his hair. In fact, there isn't even an opening in this crowd of people where could've weaseled his way through unseen.
But he went out of the same door I did.
How did he manage it?
"What is this?"
A sharp voice brings my attention back to earth. There's a short girl in a huge orange coat directly ahead, her eyes not on me, but below us––on our hands clasped together. She's pulling them apart with her free hand, revealing something that sparkles in the flashes heading our way.
I gasp, snapping my whole arm back, my fist clasped against my chest. From the way I recoil so quick, it looks like she was trying to hurt me.
"Emeray?" the girl's voice shakes and rises. "What was that?"
Adrenaline fires through me.
Did she see it was a ring?
"That was one of my earrings," I lie. My voice barely carries over all the commotion going on around us. "It's nothing."
The girl still looks shaken from my sudden recoil, so I hastily stuff the ring into my clutch and continue reassuring her. "They keep––they keep falling out." I put a hand on her cheek, feeling strangely maternal. In the midst of all my comforting, a sense of discomfort creeps in. "I'm sorry for being so startled––I thought they were going to drop onto the ground!"
With that, I turn away from the girl, gripping my clutch tightly. Smiling at the paparazzi like everything is fine and normal, I rush back into Ace, hoping that my sudden, inexplicable exit ends up playing off to my benefit––Emeray Essence, taking some time to meet fans outside the party. I can see Norax sighing with relief at such a headline as that.
I'm already forming my statement as I open the door of the vestibule. "He wasn't there," I announce. "Nobody even saw him."
"Nobody?"
"It's like he didn't even exit."
The bouncer pales, looking back at the door. When he turns back to me, he meets my gaze with a kind of fear that, for a brief moment, takes me by surprise. I can't imagine someone in his type of position, expected to appear strong and stalwart all night long, would give such a helpless look so freely on the job. It occurs to me that we are both flipped upside down tonight; my own current disposition, stumbling and scurrying and tripping on my words, contrasts heavily with the poised, lithe persona people typically expect a Famoux member to emulate.
Switches go off in my mind when I acknowledge my disposition. The eyes of every partygoer who watched as I staggered into the club bore into the back of me, individual pokers striking hot with their rumors and remarks.
And then the entire situation escapes me, dissolves like air, as Norax's dissatisfaction flashes across my eyes––right over the bouncer's face like sudden breaking news. It's like she's in the room with me, frowning.
Disappointed.
Feeling inherently watched, I straighten my spine, forcing my face to smooth into composure. Norax's face ahead of me smooths down as well.
The change is robotic, like a simple remote in the back of my head. The simplicity of it strikes a hint of discomfort in the pit of my stomach.
"Wait, wait. Where you just outside, Miss Essence?"
The vision of Norax dissolves, revealing a man in black looking at me with caution, his feet shifting on the ground where the other bouncer had just been.
"Wait," I start. "Where'd he go?"
"Pardon, Miss Essence?"
"The––the––"
I stop, catching a glimpse over his shoulder of a man turning the corner of an EMPLOYEES ONLY nook. He matches the first bouncer's structure, and he's moving fast enough to concur that he may or may not have just seen a ghost. The electronic clock on the wall above him reveals a turn of the hour.
A new shift. New staff. I was so focused on other things, I must've not even heard him say goodbye.
"Oh," I say, forcing composure. I nod to the door with nonchalance. "I was just––um, saying hello to fans."
"Without a jacket? It's still freezing out there."
I smooth out my dress in front of me, surprised to find my hands are sweating. I don't remember the last time that really happened.
"It was only a few minutes," I tell him.
The look on his face remains weary. Why is he looking at me that way?
"Well, all right," the new bouncer says, shaking his head. "You have a good night, Miss Essence."
"You too."
xxx
KEEP READING ON, FOLKS.
And always remember:
Sticks and Stones may break your bones, but haters make you famoux. Stay classy, stay classix.