But There's More To You

2 | My heart rate exceeds the limit

Cynthia Rose, widely known as Rosalie, is absent during the first segment of the award handouts after performing her newest single, Zero! Netizens suspect her absence ties up with former artist, Jade Levine's sudden disappearance after his own performance that happened to take place right before Cynthia Rose's.

"Care to explain?"

Cynthia only stared down at the cardboard cup of coffee on Kai's office desk, biting down onto her bottom lip. The beverage was the perfect shade of brown, not too dark but also not so beige and she chose to eye it down so that she would never have to move her eyes upwards to meet Kai's, way too ashamed to even make eye contact with her manager.

It hadn't went by easily, indeed Cynthia had missed her own award handout which she had to be given at the very end but that hadn't meant she wasn't scolded over and over again by her manager who only wanted the best for her or the personal CEO of the company that had a long talk with her in his office about morals and what not, that her actions have consequences now and that she should be more aware of what they could cause- she was given a warning - the first really - but Cynthia knew it had been a waste because she was the main source of income for the company, the thing that kept the building from falling apart, the person that built an actual name for the company.

Guilty, Cynthia felt...but it hadn't been because she had her first rumor ever so quickly but because she discovered that the backstage staff were the ones put to immediate blame for her impulsive actions and decisions.

"He just...he found me and helped me calm down after my performance." It wasn't a lie, but it wasn't the full truth either.

And that full truth included the fact that she messaged Jade that night when she got back home with a heavy heart after he slipped a handkerchief with his phone number into her hand and they ended up texting for hours on end till Cynthia accidentally fell asleep with her phone in her hands. The first night she could actually sleep in days due to the stress her upcoming stage performance was causing her. It was weird, weird how they were able to chat for so long when Cynthia had only known the other a few hours prior to their online conversation, and the fact that Jade had known Cynthia through the internet even from before she was exposed to the public, the moment she released her first album, and somehow that was able to calm Cynthia down a bit knowing that the other stuck around even after she was brutally revealed. It almost felt weird...how fast they got to know each other.

Cynthia wasn't sure whether it had been a blessing or a curse. She knew for a fact that getting so close so quickly never ended well for anyone really but she couldn't help the pull she felt towards the singer, the need to talk to him, out of desperation, a need for a friend but also out of intrigue, feeling the need to know more, to talk more, to understand what raced through his head and desperate times called for desperate measures.

So really, curiosity killed the cat in every universe.

And Cynthia found herself standing under a beaming light pole by the edge of a park near her apartment, a thin scarf around her neck hiding her nose and lips and a white baseball cap over her long, fluffy hair, pressing the shiny, brown strands down, waiting. She acknowledged the fact that she didn't have to cover so much when the night had already arrived and the park was deserted, the kids that usually raced around with young, cheerful chuckles and screams already tucked into their tiny beds, long gone into dreamland with the promising of tomorrow, but she couldn't risk it, she couldn't risk revealing her face knowing she was followed and already had to move apartments because her address was leaked during her first month of publicity.

It was impulsive, barely even thought well if not at all, but when Jade asked the producer if she wanted to hangout sometime the previous night after two weeks of texting, Cynthia couldn't help but say yes, desperate to know someone new, the curse of loneliness her mother had feared the most finally catching up to her and hindering her down, suffocating her till her eyes teared and her heart slowed down- bored, too discouraged to keep up with her body.