I didn’t see him on my walk home. But then again, he probably saw me, I think as I walk upstairs to my bedroom. The house is eerily quiet with Mom and Dad both out.

“Alexa, play popular hits,” I say.

“Ok. Playing popular hits from the 50s,” she says. I groan as some music I doubt was ever popular starts playing.

“Alexa, I will genderbend you and make you Australian if you don’t play some music that is popular now,” I say. A ring of cyan appears in the corner. She’s listening. Just not good at it. I pull out my phone and do it manually before, as I promised, setting her to male Australian. My room is bare but I prefer people judging me on me rather than my taste in boy band posters or lack thereof so I suppose it’s ok. Valerie is always asking me if I want her to give me a room makeover. “I won’t even charge you!” she says.

I rifle through my drawers for my acting slip folder. Lampposts seem to be the most popular options but you can find them anywhere when you look.

“Do I want to dress up like a cartoon tiger for a kid’s club?” I murmur to myself as I read through them. “Does anyone?” Why do I try? I feel like I’m always waiting for the big break, the five minutes of fame but is it worth it? Is that what I want? A tiny fly buzzes above my head. It’s wings flittering aimlessly towards my closed bedroom window. I use a leaflet telling me ‘everyone has a star inside!’ to swat it leaving a dark smudge on the glass. I hear the words from the car. Snakes and stones never broke my bones.

“Alexa, skip,” I say.

“Or’m sorry. Or dorn’t knor that one,” Alexa tells me. It frustrates me that that song brought back so many good memories of karaoke nights at Friday’s but now, it just reminds me how bad I fucked up with Sheena and my friendship just like the fraying pink pieces of thread in my bottom drawer and the diary entries saying we were going to go to Hollywood to become famous actresses. How quickly things can change. And how painfully. It’s weird how when I decided to push her away, I felt amazing and looking back, I still think I made the right choice but it’s later when the guilt creeps up.

Hi Sheena, r u ok?

I type into Whatsapp.

do u need me to come pick you up from another sketchy alleyway?

You didn’t need to come

I say it because it’s true. Maybe beneath the kohl and the snarky comments, she actually cares. Fuck it. Of course she doesn’t.

Sheena, y cant u just get over it. I want to be on good terms but u keep acting bitchy towards me

if u want to be on good terms then y r u calling me a bitch

I turn off my phone. There’s no point. Sheena has an answer to everything and what do I get? Nothing. I go back to my acting leaflets and see one with a birds eye view picture of an island, green with trees and patches of gray where there must be towns. I bet they don’t pay for the travel though. It’s easy to distract myself with these stupid audition invites, to imagine what life would be like without the fine print.

Can you see yourself in a career of acting? Well maybe this show can boost it. We’re looking for inexperienced actors and actresses to audition for our part scripted, part reality TV show. It’ll be set on an island where you or the other contestants can win $1,000,000. We need people who are good at improvising and quick thinkers as well as talented actors.

Auditions will be held from 26th April to the 10th May in the Town Hall. For more information, please visit https://www.thecrownofsnakes/auditions_page.com

They haven’t mentioned the salary on the paper which is a red flag but I’ve been to a lot of auditions gone wrong so what’s one more? I open my laptop and visit the link. More photos of the island. Some zoomed in shots of the specific towns. The TV show with the biggest budget ever made, it advertises. I’m not sure why they think that’s a good thing, wasting money on building a whole island set. Unlike some websites I’ve seen, there’s a messaging device. The history is mostly viewers asking other viewers how to book an audition. Verdict- you can’t. You just show up.

Hi, my name is Vicki. I’m a budding actress from California who’s waiting for my big break. I’m coming to this audition. What about you?

The message is short and looks dumb when I read it back after posting it but it’s a little bit of proof that I am coming to this audition. I close my laptop and throw all the leaflets in the bin except the Crown of Snakes one which I fold up and place in the back of my handbag. I pull out the glinting thing in the bottom before realizing that it’s just the bracelet Valerie bought me. I fiddle with charms for a bit. I love the feeling of jewelry in my fingers. It could be a coincidence, that the charms are a snake and a crown or maybe it’s a sign. Maybe I’ll get lucky, like the number 13, maybe I’ll get the job. Or maybe I’m so desperate that I’m making shit up so I have something to keep me going. I slide the charm bracelet on my wrist and stand up. I jog downstairs and pull on my white sneakers.

The author's content has been appropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

*

Valerie meets me at Boba House. I’ve already ordered her mango bubble tea by the time she opens the door. The bell jangles with her layered necklaces and she makes her way to my table. Her face crinkles slightly with confusion. I assume it’s because I paid for her boba but she doesn’t mention it.

“Big news?” she asks, her lips making a ‘o’ around the pink straw. I nod and slide the advertisement across the table. She doesn’t stop sipping as she reads. “Vicki! I’m so happy for you! Did you get in?” An old woman sitting on a table close to us narrows her eyes above the book she’s reading.

“Not yet. I’m auditioning tomorrow,” I say. Her face suggests she thinks it’s just as big an achievement. “And I want you to be there.”

“Of course I’ll be there,” she says.

“No,” I say, staring into her green eyes. “I want you to audition with me.” Her white toothed smile falters and she leaves my eye contact. “Val. Please. I need this.” She puts her hand on mine. I feel the cool metal of her rings dig into my skin.

“No,” she says, quietly. “Vicki. You want this. I don’t want it.” Her words hurt more than the rings. I want this? Does she think this is some stupid hobby? That it’s not important? I suppose she doesn’t know the real reason as to why I have to get out of this town but there are others. She’s aware of my money issues, mommy issues and many other issues.

“Val. I don’t want to go into this alone. Please. I have no one else to ask.” She swirls her boba with her straw.

“Vicki, stop,” she says. “You can ask Sheena or Katherine.” She knows that I can’t. They both hate me, just one is better at hiding it under the blackout veil of false compliments and passive aggression. I stand up suddenly and walk up to the guy running the store.

“You want more drink?” he asks in a thick japanese accent. His hair flops around as he puts down the cloth he was wiping the kitchen counter with.

“Do you want to come on a reality show with me?” I ask. His black eyes widen in shock. “You can use it to promote your store.”

“You,” he points to me, “want me,” he points back at himself, “to go on TV with you?” I nod. “This is prank.”

“No. My best friend doesn’t want to go with me so I have no one to go with.” I decide to not mention the fact that he is kind of cute. He nods.

“If not prank then yes,” he says. “I’m Kiyoshi.” I tell him my name and the details of the audition and we shake on it. I’m surprised at the outcome. When I sit back down, Valerie shoots me a look.

“You invited a stranger to go on an island with you for a month. I’ll go. I’d rather go than let you drag along a poor man who doesn’t know what he’s in for,” she says. I guess she wasn’t there. I guess she didn’t see the look on his face.

“No way. Kiyoshi wants to come. I’m taking him but you can come as well,” I say. Valerie looks over at him.

“He does look nice,” she says when he gives her a big smile and a wave. She waves back. “Ok fine. I’ll come too.”

“You can’t bring Luna,” I say, remembering the times she’s come over for a sleepover and brought her snake. ‘She’s not venomous! She won’t hurt you!’ Just the thought of the pearly white scales slithering somewhere in the same house as me was enough to tell Valerie to take her home. Not massively unreasonable.

The bell rings as someone walks in. Kiyoshi asks their order but they obviously don’t order anything because he goes back to wiping the surfaces when they step away from the counter and the ever-pawing lucky cat that sits atop it. At first my brain thinks him and my breaths quicken but I see that it’s Sheena. What the heck is she doing here? Her blonde hair looks shorter than it was in the car journey and a little bit more jagged. It could be that the rain makes it look different though. She drags over a stool from the old woman’s table and sits on it before taking the leaflet and reading it.

“You’re still doing acting?” she asks. There’s something in her voice that I don’t like. I nod and snatch it back. Valerie senses the tension and strikes up a conversation with the old woman.

“Why are you here?” I ask. She doesn’t answer. “For fuck’s sake.” Valerie and the woman both give me cold stares. “Can’t you talk anymore? God. Just go away or give me a reason why I shouldn’t make you.” Her pupils flicker slightly. She didn’t expect that.

“I’m here because you told me to meet you here,” she says. Now I falter because I didn’t. I check my phone but the last message on our chat is still if ‘u want to be on good terms then y r u calling me a bitch’. How could someone text from my number without it showing up on my phone? “And now I’m leaving since you clearly don’t want me here and let’s face it- the feeling’s very much mutual.” She stands up and walks out the door. Valerie rushes out to follow her, the only thing I hear is the jingling of the bell before I have to decipher their conversation by lipreading which I can’t. However I can see that Valerie is using her ‘you are wanted’ hand expressions and Sheena’s using her ‘god aren’t you a sad little Vicki tag along’ facial expressions which I don’t like to see. Kiyoshi leans over the counter to talk to me.

“Third wheel?” he asks. I frown. What? “She always caught in middle of argument?” I’m about to tell him that’s not what it means but he speaks first. “Maybe better when all friends.”