Delaney
The casting office is a warehouse of desperation. The air is thick with the scent of cheap hairspray and palpable anxiety. Dozens of young women, all with some variation of the same hungry hope in their eyes, are scattered on mismatched chairs, clutching scripts like holy texts. They look like me. The old me.
I sign in at the front desk, my hand steady. The name I write, Delaney Walsh, feels solid. Real. It’s no longer the name of a victim.
“Ellie? Is that you?”
The voice is a confection of sugar and venom. I turn. Serena Croft stands by the water cooler, a vision in a cream-colored pantsuit that probably cost more than my first and last month’s rent combined. Her hair is perfect. Her smile is a weapon.
“Serena,” I say, my tone perfectly neutral. “I didn’t realize you were auditioning for this.”
She lets out a little laugh, a practiced tinkling sound. “Oh, God, no. Of course not. Arthur sent me the script for a laugh. It’s so… gritty. I’m just here to drop off a tape for a real movie. I saw your name on the sign-in sheet and I just had to make sure you were okay.”
Her eyes do a slow, insulting sweep of my simple black t-shirt and jeans. “I was so worried after you had your little episode at Sterling’s office. Tearing up a contract like that… people are talking. They’re saying you’ve lost it.”
“People should find more interesting things to talk about,” I say, leaning against the wall, projecting a calm I don’t entirely feel. The ghost of my past self is screaming at me to apologize, to beg, to fix this.
I tell her to shut up.
Serena’s smile wavers. She expected tears. Hysteria. “I’m just trying to help. Jake is a wreck, you know. He’s completely heartbroken.”
“Is he? Or is he just upset his meal ticket walked out the door?”
The shot lands. A flicker of genuine anger crosses her face before she plasters the concern back on. “That’s cruel, Ellie. You know he loved you. We both did. I just don’t want to see you throw your life away on some no-budget indie film in a desperate attempt to feel… what? In control?”
“It’s better than being a puppet,” I reply softly. “Isn’t it tiring, Serena? Always having someone else’s hand up your back, making your mouth move?”
Her jaw tightens. The other actresses in the room are starting to notice, pretending to read their scripts while their eyes dart between us. A show is happening right here, and it's far more interesting than the one they came for.
“I have a seven-figure deal on the table for a blockbuster franchise,” she hisses, her voice dropping to a venomous whisper. “You have an audition in a warehouse in Burbank. You tell me who the puppet is.”
“Delaney Walsh?” a harried-looking assistant calls from a doorway. “We’re ready for you.”
I give Serena a small, tight smile. It’s a smile I learned from a thirty-five-year-old woman who’d seen it all. “Enjoy your franchise, Serena. Try not to trip on the strings.”
I walk away, leaving her standing there, her perfect mask finally cracking at the edges. I don’t look back.
The audition room is spare. A black curtain, a camera on a tripod, a simple table, and two chairs. A woman with tired eyes and a kind face, the casting director, gives me a brief nod. Beside her sits a man I assume is the director, Marcus Rylan. He’s younger than I expected, with an intense, quiet energy. He just watches me, his eyes missing nothing.
“Hi, Delaney. I’m Sarah. This is Marcus,” the casting director says. “Whenever you’re ready. You’ll be reading the scene where Anya confronts her uncle.”
I nod. I know the scene. It’s the heart of the movie. It’s the moment Anya stops being a victim of her grief and starts fighting back.
I take a breath, but it’s not for the character. It’s for me. I’m not reaching for a feeling. I’m opening a door. I let the thirty-five-year-old woman in the hospital bed step forward. I let her sorrow, her rage, her suffocating regret fill me.
I look at the empty chair across from me, but I don’t see an imaginary uncle. I see Arthur Sterling. I see Jake. I see Serena. I see every producer who told me to lose five more pounds, every director who looked through me, every fake friend who smiled to my face and sharpened a knife behind my back.
My voice, when it comes out, is not the voice of a twenty-year-old girl. It’s frayed. It’s weary. It’s dangerous.
“You think you can just erase it?” I say, the words from the script feeling like they were pulled from my own soul. “You think you can just burn down the house and pretend there was never a home there? That we were never a family?”
The pain isn’t acted. It’s unleashed. A single tear tracks down my cheek, hot and real. It’s not a performance choice. It’s a memory of a heart monitor flatlining.
“There is nothing left for you to take,” I whisper, my voice cracking, the final line delivered with the chilling finality of a death sentence. “The fire already took everything.”
Silence. It hangs in the room, heavy and absolute. I can hear the faint hum of the fluorescent lights above. I haven’t just performed a scene. I’ve bled on their floor.
Sarah, the casting director, is staring at me, her pen frozen above her notepad. Her mouth is slightly open.
Marcus Rylan leans forward. He hasn’t moved a muscle the entire time. His eyes are dark, piercing. They don’t see a young actress. They see something else. Something ancient.
“Thank you, Delaney,” he says, his voice quiet but resonant. It cuts through the thick silence. He looks at Sarah, then back at me.
“Where did you learn to do that?” he asks. It’s not a question about acting school.
I meet his intense gaze. I give him a piece of the truth. “I’ve lived a very long life.”
His expression doesn’t change, but something flickers in his eyes. Understanding. Intrigue. He nods slowly.
“Thank you for your time,” Sarah says, finally finding her voice. It sounds a little shaky.
I walk out of the room, my legs feeling strangely light. I don’t look at the other hopefuls in the waiting area. I don’t look for Serena. I just walk out into the blinding California sun. I’ve done it. I’ve laid my ghost bare. Now, all I can do is wait.
Hours later, the silence of my empty apartment is deafening. I sit on the floor, replaying the audition in my head. Did I do too much? Was it too real, too raw? The doubt is a bitter taste in my mouth.
My cheap cell phone buzzes against the hardwood floor, the sound like an explosion. I snatch it up. It’s Leo’s number.
I take a breath to steady myself. “Hello?”
“Tell me you have good news for me, Delaney Walsh.” His voice is a live wire. The tired, skeptical kid from the phone call yesterday is gone. This is the man who will one day build an empire.
“I don’t know yet,” I say, keeping my own voice level. “The audition was… intense.”
“Intense is good. Did you do what I told you? Did you make them forget everyone else?”
“I think so.”
“You think so?” he presses, the energy crackling through the phone. “Because I’ve been doing my homework. Marcus Rylan is a genius. A recluse, but a genius. His student film is legendary in certain circles. And the script for ‘Echo Creek’ has been on the Black List for two years. People thought it was unfilmable, too dark. Nobody would touch it.”
“They were wrong,” I say.
“They were damn wrong! This isn’t some student project, Delaney. This is a potential masterpiece. If he casts it right. If he gets his Anya.”
My heart is pounding now, a frantic drum against my ribs. “Leo…”
“How did you know? How did you know this was the project? I’ve been in this business my whole life, I’ve read thousands of scripts. I would have missed this one. Everyone missed this one. But you didn’t.”
“I told you. I’m meticulous.”
There’s a pause. I can hear him take a deep breath, like a man standing at the edge of a cliff, about to jump.
“Okay,” he says, his voice dropping, all business. “The fifty-fifty split is ridiculous. We’ll do seventy-thirty, in your favor. Once we make our first million, we can renegotiate to eighty-twenty. I’ll be your manager, not your agent. I work for you, and only you. I’ll draw up the papers tonight.”
The relief hits me so hard I feel dizzy. I lean my head back against the wall. The first pillar is in place. It’s solid.
“You don’t even know if I got the part yet,” I say, a small smile touching my lips for the first time all day.
I can almost hear him grin on the other end of the line. “The casting director is Sarah Finn. She’s famous for two things: discovering unknowns and calling the agent the second the right actor walks out of the room. She hasn’t called me yet.”
My stomach plummets. “Oh.”
“She called Marcus Rylan’s producing partner ten minutes ago,” Leo continues, and I can hear the triumphant joy in his voice. “She told him they’d found their Anya. She said she’d never seen anything like it. And she asked for my number to make the official offer.”
I close my eyes. It’s real.
“So, I’ll ask you again, Delaney Walsh,” Leo says, his voice brimming with a shared, fierce ambition that feels like coming home. “Are you ready to go conquer the industry?”
I open my eyes and look around the empty room. It’s not empty anymore. It’s the starting line.
“Yes, Leo,” I say, and the name feels like my own again. “I am.”
