The Downfall.

Natalia

One week later.

It has been exactly one week and my career is in a box on the floor and I don't know how to pick it up.

"Okay." Danny drops his phone on my coffee table and presses both hands to his face. "Okay. Okay okay okay."

"You keep saying that," I say.

"Because I keep hoping it'll mean something different." He drags his hands down his face and looks at me with the expression of a man watching a building collapse in slow motion. "Lia. Babe. They pulled the Voss campaign."

"I know."

"And the Meridian press tour..."

"I know, Danny."

"And this morning Warner's called Marcus and said the project is on..."

"Hold," I finish. "They put it on hold. I know. I was there when Marcus told us." I pull my knees to my chest on the couch. "I was standing right next to you."

Danny stares at me. He has been my best friend since we were twenty-three and broke and sharing a one-bedroom in Koreatown, and I have seen every version of his face. Right now his face is doing something I don't have a name for.

"You're very calm," he says.

"I know."

"That's scaring me more than the crying would."

"I'm not going to cry."

"Lia..."

"I'm not." I look at the TV. It's muted. My face is on it ... a screenshot from the video, my hand raised, Cecily's head turning, frozen in the worst possible frame. The chyron below reads MONROE MELTDOWN: Sources Say Pattern Of Abuse Spans Years. "I don't even understand where they're getting this from. It was one time. It was one time and she provoked me and there were two people in that room who saw what actually happened and neither of them is talking."

"Actually." Danny picks up his phone. Sets it down again. Picks it up. "That's the thing."

I look at him.

"There's ... okay, there's a new one." He turns the phone toward me slowly, like he's showing me something that might bite. "Posted this morning."

I take it.

It's a video. A man I vaguely recognize ... a grip from the set of my last film, I think, maybe craft services, I'm not sure ... sitting in front of a ring light, speaking directly to camera.

"I saw her reduce a PA to tears once," he's saying. "Like, full breakdown, in the middle of a shoot day. She didn't even apologize. Just walked away."

"I have never..." I start.

"There's another one."

"Danny..."

"And another one after that." He takes the phone back gently. "Seven total as of this morning. All different people. All saying different things." He pauses. "Some of them I don't think even worked on anything you've been on."

I stare at him.

"Someone is finding them," I say slowly. "Someone is ... this isn't organic. Seven people don't all decide on the same morning to..."

"I know." His voice is quiet. "I know that. You know that." He spreads his hands. "The internet doesn't know that."

I stand up. I can't sit anymore. I walk to the window and look out at the city and think about how three weeks ago I was standing in this same spot thinking about my speech, thinking about the dress, thinking about nothing more complicated than whether to wear my hair up or down.

"I've been calling Tristan," I say.

"I know."

"He's not picking up."

"I know."

"Fourteen calls, Danny. Fourteen." I press my fingers to the glass. "Not because I want him back. I just..." I stop. "I need to understand. I need someone to explain to me how this..." I gesture vaguely at the TV, at my face frozen mid-slap, at the chyron still rolling, "...how this happened in seven days."

Danny is quiet for a moment. "Have you tried Cecily?"

"Her number is disconnected." I laugh, and it comes out strange. "Her number is disconnected. Who disconnects their number? Who does that unless they're..."

"Hiding," Danny says.

"Unless they're hiding." I turn around. "Something is wrong. Something is very, very wrong and I can't..."

"Lia." Danny stands up. "Come sit down."

"I don't want to sit down..."

"Please." He says it quietly. "Please just come sit down. Marcus is working on a statement and we're going to figure out the press strategy and we'll get through..."

"Every movie I had," I say. "Danny. Every single project. On hold or cancelled or... three years of work. Three years." My voice doesn't shake. I'm proud of that. "My mother died eight months ago and I threw myself into work because it was the only thing that made me feel..." I stop. Press my lips together. "And now I don't even have that."

Danny doesn't say anything. He just opens his arms.

I stand there for a second.

Then I walk over and let him hug me, and I stare over his shoulder at my face on the muted television, and I think about how strange it is to watch your life come apart from the inside.

"We'll fix it," he says into my hair.

"You don't know that."

"I know." He squeezes once. "I'm saying it anyway."

________________________________________

I'm making tea I won't drink when Danny appears in the kitchen doorway.

"Hey," he says carefully. "Come look at something."

Something in his voice makes me set the mug down.

The television isn't muted anymore.

It's a live interview. One of those soft-lit evening shows with the comfortable chairs and the host who tilts their head a lot. And in the chair across from the host, in a grey suit, looking tired and handsome and carefully, deliberately remorseful...

Tristan.

"...wanted to come and say something publicly," he's saying, "because I think people deserve to hear it from me directly."

The host nods. Tilts her head. "And what is it you want to say, Tristan?"

"I want to start by apologizing." He folds his hands. Looks at them. Looks up. "To Cecily, to everyone who's come forward this week ... I'm sorry I wasn't braver sooner. I saw things on set, things in private, and I told myself it wasn't my place." A pause. "I should have said something."

I go very still.

"He's not," I say.

Danny doesn't respond.

"He is not..."

"Shhh."

"...difficult to love," Tristan is saying, and the shift in his voice is so subtle, so perfectly calibrated ... fond and sad and helpless all at once. "And I did love her. I want to be clear about that. But there were ... patterns. Things I excused because I cared about her. Things I shouldn't have excused."

"What kinds of things?" the host asks, soft and leading.

"Just..." He exhales. Shakes his head slowly. "A temper. A need for control. The way she spoke to people when she thought no one important was watching." He looks at the camera briefly and then away, humble, regretful. "I don't want people to hate her. That's not why I'm here."

"Oh how noble," I say. My voice sounds like it's coming from somewhere else.

"She lost her mother earlier this year," Tristan continues quietly. "And I think ... I really do believe ... that she's not okay. That what people saw this week isn't just who she is, it's someone who is struggling." A pause. "Deeply struggling. And who maybe needs help that I..." his voice catches, perfectly timed, "...that I wasn't able to give her."

The host makes a soft sympathetic sound.

The mug in my hand is very close to being thrown through the television.

"He's implying I've lost my mind," I say. Very quietly. Very carefully. "He's sitting on national television implying that I have lost my mind..."

"Lia..."

"My mother. He just used my mother on a talk show..."

"I know..."

"I want to..." I stop. I breathe. There are several things I want to do and none of them are legal. "I'm going to call him. Right now. I'm going to..."

My phone rings.

I look down at it.

Dad.

I stare at the screen. Then at the television, where Tristan is wrapping up, where he's saying something about wishing me well, where the host is looking at him like he's just said something incredibly brave.

And then Tristan looks at the camera.

Just for a second. Just a flash ... there and gone so fast you'd miss it if you weren't watching for it.

But I'm watching.

His eyes are smiling.

She should have listened to me.

That's what that look says. As clear as if he'd said it out loud.

She should have listened.

My phone keeps ringing.

I pick it up.

"Dad..." I start.

"Come home."