The first time I see Evan Kade up close, he’s yelling.
From my corner of the control room, half-hidden behind a stack of cable coils, his voice slices through the air like someone’s hit a wrong note in a live performance.
“No.” The word lands hard, sharp enough that even the interns stop pretending not to listen. “I’m not doing that twist. We agreed the finale was locked.”
On the wall of screens, a dozen camera feeds show him from different angles—jaw set, shoulders tight in the fitted black shirt wardrobe picked to telegraph “brooding romantic hero.” In person, though, he’s less polished and more…real. His hair’s still damp from a quick rinse, curling at the nape of his neck, and there’s a tiny smear of eyeliner under one eye where makeup missed a spot.
I shouldn’t be noticing that.
I shouldn’t be here at all.
“Lia,” Harper hisses at my elbow, nudging me with a pen. “You dropped the call sheet. Again. If Marla sees you standing still, she’ll sacrifice you to the ratings gods.”
I bend quickly, scooping up the papers I’d scattered in my not-so-graceful attempt to ghost through the room. The control room hums around us, the air frigid from overworked AC and the scent of burnt coffee and hairspray mixing into something uniquely, nauseatingly television.
On the main monitor, Evan faces Marla Quinn, our executive producer, in the wings of the soundstage. She’s in her usual armor: tailored white blazer, sleek ponytail, smile that could cut glass.
“Relax,” she coos, patting his arm like he’s a skittish show horse. “It’s not that big a change. Think of it as…a final test. The audience will eat it up.”
“That’s not what my contract says,” he fires back.
I almost drop the papers again. No one says that to Marla. Not on camera. Not off.
Beside me, Harper makes a low appreciative sound. “Our golden boy’s grown teeth.”
“Harper,” I whisper, even though she’s not wrong.
I’m just a production assistant. Background furniture. The girl who brings coffee, resets water bottles, and knows which contestants cry quietly in bathroom stalls so I can pretend not to see them. My job is to be invisible, and I’m good at it.
But I’m close enough to the monitors that I can see the micro-twitch in Marla’s jaw before she leans in, her hand still on Evan’s arm, her voice lowering.
“Your contract says you trust us,” she murmurs, the audio feed catching every syllable. “We made you, Evan. Don’t challenge the people who know how to keep you on top.”
A tech glances at me, eyebrows raised. I look away. I do not react. That’s the first rule of surviving in a place like this: see everything, show nothing.
Evan’s eyes flick to the cameras briefly, as if he feels them on him the way I feel the AC on my bare arms. “What’s the twist?” he asks.
And just like that, the air in the control room seems to thin. Even the director, usually barking countdowns, goes quiet, waiting. For a moment, all twenty screens feel like windows into the same breathless pause.
Marla’s smile widens. “We’re bringing in a civilian,” she says. “Someone with no agenda, no media training. Completely random. You pick her, you prove you’re here for real love, not just the spotlight. The viewers will swoon. Twitter will implode. It’s genius.”
