Page 41 of Desirous

“Hello?” I call out, hoping the next thing that happens isn’t someone turning all the lights out. This literally feels like half a dozen horror films I’ve seen in my life.

“Kat? We’re over here!” Maria yells from a door off the set.

Strange. I’ve never noticed that room before. Was it always there?

Cautiously, I walk in that direction, terrified something bad is about to happen. My gut says this isn’t good. I don’t know if it’s horror film bad, but this feels off.

But when I reach her, Maria is all smiles and wraps her arm around my shoulders to guide me into the room. I see Shane sitting at a table looking just as warm and friendly as his fellow producer. Okay, maybe this won’t be bad.

“Thank you for coming in on such short notice. We wanted to talk to you about what happened,” he says as I sit down across from him and Maria takes a seat right next to him.

“Okay. I’m not sure what there is to talk about,” I say, not sure I want to let them in on the fact that I know all about Emma’s attempt at drugging Alex on their date the other night.

Better to let them do all the talking here.

“Well, we thought it would be a good idea to get the truth out once and for all,” Maria says in her usual overly chipper way.

“The truth? I didn’t poison poor Murphy. I would never do that just like I would never tamper with another chef’s knives. I told you all of this that day, but you didn’t want to hear it and had me escorted out of the building by security.”

As I say that, my gut tells me something is wrong here. Looking around, I see this room is set up with cameras from every angle. Are they taping me? Why did they want to meet me in here?

“What’s going on? You heard all of that already, and you don’t seem to be doing much talking, so I’m getting a weird vibe here. Where are all the other contestants?” I ask, my anxiety ratcheting higher notch by notch as the seconds tick by.

Just then, the door opens and Emma walks in. This is wrong. Why is she here if they wanted to talk to me?

I move to get up, but Shane quickly stops me. “Wait. Kat, we know what happened. Emma knows too.”

My former friend looks at me and then him with total confusion. “I have no idea what you mean. Why did Randy tell me I needed to come in here to talk to you guys if she’s in here?”

“Emma, sit down. We have things to discuss,” Maria says in a somber tone that’s unlike anything I’ve ever heard come from her before.

“Things to discuss? Like what? And why is Kat here? You threw her off the show for good reason. She poisoned someone. Why would you have her back here?” Emma says, practically spitting my name from her mouth.

“I didn’t poison anyone!” I scream, already tired of whatever’s going on here. “You did. Just like you tried to drug Alex on your supposed date the other night. Oh, yeah. I know all about that. You actually thought you could make him want you if you roofied him? That’s so pathetic!”

Rage shoots from her eyes, and I watch her hands tighten into fists at her side. “That’s a lie! Now she’s here trying to get me thrown off the show too.” Turning toward Shane and Maria, she says, “Can’t you see what she’s doing? She was sleeping with Alex, and she’s jealous because he and I went to dinner. She’s insane!”

I slam my chair into the table to get everyone’s attention. “I am not insane. I never drugged anyone. It was you all along. You pretended to be my friend, but you were out to get me the entiretime. You probably did this on the first reality show you were on. They probably kicked you off that one too, didn’t they?”

As Emma seethes, Maria says, “We know about everything, Emma. Randy confessed to it all. He told us what you did with Alex’s drink, and he told us it was you who came in here with his help that night and put something in Kat’s chicken bourguignon. What I’m curious about is why.”

Her eyes grow wild, and for a moment, I’m worried I made a mistake pushing that chair away from me. At least it could have been a small buffer to stop her if she decides to attack me, which is exactly what she looks like she wants to do right now.

Thankfully, Shane stands up and says, “It’s over, Emma. All we want is to know why. Why make it look like Kat poisoned the food? Clearly, you liked Alex, so why would you want him to be hurt by eating it?”

“I didn’t think he’d eat it. I thought she would!” she screams with such venom in her voice that I back up a few steps.

The three of us shake our heads, clearly not understanding Emma’s motives. Why does she hate me so much?

“So you wanted to make Kat sick? Why?”

“Because then she’d be off the show! I know who her father is. I bet she gets preferential treatment all the time because she’s the daughter of the great Andrew Truesdale. Then I saw how well she and Alex were getting along that day, and I hated that. She knew I liked him, but no. She was over there smiling and laughing, as if she actually liked him after telling me she hated everything about him. So I put the drug into her precious dish and assumed she’d eat it the next day. But then you made us switch and poor Murphy got stuck eating her terrible food.”

I listen as she confesses to trying to ruin me and wonder how she could ever think I get anything good because of who my father is. All I’ve ever gotten for being related to AndrewTruesdale is an inferiority complex and more insecurity than any one person should ever have to carry around.

Shane looks up toward one of the cameras near the ceiling and asks, “Did we get all of that?”

A man’s voice from somewhere outside the room answers, “Yep. Got it all. This is going to be great for the show.”

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