The Timeline [h.s.]

62.

February 8th, 2018:

And so, Claire had been called back for a second audition , for the recurring role in the miniseries where Naomi Watts was the main character.

Despite her thinking that she had canned the first one, she had gotten a call back.

She hadn't believed Alfie Allen when he had told her that she had been amazing, she had shown him that emotional depth and the sophistication he had decanted and that had enchanted him so much back when he had first seen her act in the short movie she had shot with Beatrix.

Claire had simply shrugged and blushed, shaking her head and trying to play it off, play coy and say that she hadn't been more impressive than she was sure all the other candidates were. She had met some of them in the corridor, as they waited for their names to be called.

Each one of them, to Claire, had looked much more qualified than she was for the role. They all had some minor appearance as extras in many shows in the UK - although Claire hadn't seen any of them, mostly because she wasn't very into police or medical shows that went on for thousands of seasons. They had all met some pretty famous names in the UK acting landscape, and all of their agents belonged to ancient and important talent agencies that Claire had seen in this or that brochure going around LAMDA, especially during her final year there.

She had felt so unimpressive, standing next to them, the only roles under her belt being the short movie she had done with Beatrix - for which she had won an award, yes, but an award in Italy! - and the theater show that might or might have not been reprising in the spring. She just shrugged and wished everyone good luck, knowing she would be losing the role to one of them, most likely.

Alfie had been in the room during the audition as well, standing right behind the table where the casting director for the Netflix show and the producers had been sitting, all with their arms crossed, looking unimpressed as Claire sat on the little stool provided for her, where the camera would be getting a good medium closeup of her as she read her lines and tried to convince the board that she was good enough for the part.

She hadn't felt good enough, nor had they let any emotion seep out of their carefully blank curated expressions. They had simply nodded their heads and thanked her for going there, telling her they'd be in touch if anything positive happened. Alfie had been smiling, nodding and giving Claire many thumbs up after the audition and during the verdict.

Claire had left the room with a sense of dread in her stomach. Not only had she been so sure about the whole thing, and had managed to make a fool of herself in front of her father when she had told him about the whole thing. She wouldn't even have the little victory of telling him that, yes, she had been picked up for the role. So maybe, she wouldn't do anything for the world as a whole, but at least she'd be able to provide hers and Theodore's next meals for the months coming with the pay.

Instead, she had left the audition with the certainty that her phone wouldn't have pinged with positive news, cursing herself out for having done so poorly at the yoga session the day before, the nerves for the audition stopping her from delivering a good performance and proving that she wasn't as pathetic as she felt. She had picked at the food in her plate at home, lying straight to her friends' faces and telling them she had been to see her sister with Theodore - which, to be fair, she had been, to drop Theodore off for a playdate with the twins at Anna's studio/salon.

She had debated whether she should be telling her friends about the audition or not. On one side, under the column of the pros of doing so, Claire knew that they would've been ecstatic for her, they would've supported her, they would've even offered to drive her to the audition and whatnot; on the other side, however, under the column of the cons of doing so, Claire was sure that they would be pestering her to know why she hadn't told them before, and that would've kickstarted an avalanche of information she would've rather not revealed. Just thinking about it made her want to cry, her chest filling with tears and the back of her throat burning.