Just By Putting On a Smile

Chapter 17- Fame Over Family

**Demi's POV**
It's been a few days since the concert, I haven't stopped receiving hate comments and tweets telling me how I sang awfully and they wanted their 'Queen Bee' to sing the high note. Like obviously I'm nothing compared to Beyoncé, but I'm also a 19 year old girl. I can't say the hate hasn't got to me, I can't say I haven't cut, I can't say I haven't been trying to starve myself, and I can't say I haven't been purging. With someone always being with me, it's hard to starve myself. So I've had to resort to purging, and doing it more frequently.

We just finished up with auditions and we're backstage, waiting for an interview we have.
"What if they say something about my dad?" I whisper to Kelly.
"You haven't said anything about it yet though, they don't know." She reassures me.
"I know, sorry I'm just a bit paranoid." I say, I don't know why but I just have a really weird feeling.

The interviewers arrive with their camera crew, and the other judges and myself sit down on chairs in a row. He asks about the talent so far, and Paulina's concerts she's been doing recently, and Kelly's new single that is out.
"So Demi, what should we expect from you in your upcoming album? Genre wise," He asks me.
"Well, it's no secret I started off more pop-rock, but my voice has evolved since then. Their will be more R&B, and a few more pop songs that you can dance to," I say.
"Any musical inspirations?" He asks.
"I love Kelly Clarkson. She's always been someone I look up to, I remember being really young and sitting in my room, trying to reach her notes and sing like her. I also love Christina Aguilera, she's amazing. And recently I met Beyoncé, which was amazing since I have always loved her and her music." I say.
"So Simon, any guests for the show? And performances you can tell us about? Maybe Kelly Clarkson?" The interviewer says laughing and pointing at me.
"Well, there's not much I can te-" I cut Simon off,
"Please have Kelly Clarkson, please grandpaaaaa," I whine making everyone laugh really hard.

The interviewer goes on about other things for like 10 minutes when I realise we only have 2 minutes to the end of the interview.
"We would also just like to give our condolences to you and your family Demi," The interviewer says. My face goes sheet white.
"How do you know?" Simon interrupts. I get really anxious and panic arises in me. I squeeze Kelly's hand, live I did on the first day of auditions when I felt a panic attack coming.

Kelly grabs me by the wrist, directly on my brand new cuts, making me flinch back. She takes me off backstage, luckily this interview has no audience, it's just for YouTube.

Kelly talks me through my panic attack, and helping my breathing back to normal while I'm gasping for air. When my breathing is back to being semi-normal, Kelly asks me a question.
"Dem, can I see your wrists?" She says, I try to swallow the panic arising in me.
"Kelly? W-What? No." I say getting defensive.
"Baby why did you flinch?" She asks, before I can answer, the others walk into the room. She shoots me a 'we'll talk later' look.
"Sorry Demi, that guy wa-" Simon starts,
"Si it's fine, it's his job. Did you find out how he found out?" I ask him.
"I asked, he said it's all over Instagram, he's not 100% sure how it got out." Simon said.

I pull out my phone and see Instagram is swarmed of screenshots of the comment section of a post. I see Dallas' user name, oh no.

On Instagram someone said in the comments of Dallas' post-
'@/demislovatic : Could Demi be any more perfect?🥰'
And Dallas replied -
'@/theoneandonlydallaslovato : Yes. She could start by actually going to her fucking FATHERS funeral.'
'@/theoneandonlydallaslovato : At this point she cares more about fame than her own family'

My mouth hangs wide open and my eyes fill with tears. My own sister, throwing me under the bus. I read some comments, and all of them are slamming me for being so disrespectful and selfish. Everyone is against me in this, because of my own sister, I can't believe this.

This is what she thinks of me? A little bitch who is fame hungry. I care about family so much more than fame. I see she deleted the comments almost immediately, but someone got a screenshot.

"All my fans think I'm an absolute dick, when in reality I was raped. I wanted to be at that funeral more than anyone else there. I needed the closure, for... other reasons. A-and I couldn't do that. To make the situation worse my own fucking sister just slammed me by telling everyone I 'didn't attend the funeral' and even worse, she claimed that I 'care more about fame than family', I can't believe my own sister would do this," I sob into Kelly's arms. Everyone checks Instagram and immediately sees the screenshot, it's everywhere.
"Dem you need to tell her, she thinks you purposefully missed your fathers funeral." Simon says.
"I can't do that to her, she'll blame herself and say it should've been her, I don't want to hurt her. Plus she hates me right now." I say.
"Demi, she'll find out at some point and it will hurt her more than ever that you didn't tell her." Simon says
"Dem, how about I tell her. I have her number from a while ago and I could say something?" Kelly offers.
"I mean, if you don't mind-" I'm interrupted by my phone ringing. I pick up my phone and see the name 'Dally<3' illuminated across the screen. I try to stay strong and hold back the severe anxiety I'm fighting right now
"Too late," I mumble.