Chapter 03

The plane journey was not long, but I felt my legs respond stiffly as I got off from the plane and entered the airport.Maybe it was because I was returning back home after so many years and would be staying for more than a month, maybe it was the anticipation of seeing him, but I felt like an imposter trapped in my own body. Detached. Like someone else was commanding my body to do the simple mechanical tasks while a whirlwind wrecked havoc in my brain.

I was jolted from my thoughts when the crowd outside the airport caught sight of me started chanting my name and cameras started flashing. If I was not so used to it, I would have been blinded by the glare of the flashes. Time to don the mask and become the ‘fairy idol Phoenix’ that everyone loved.

Smile, pose, Sign.

Smile, pose, Sign.

Repeated until my face protested from smiling anymore and my thumbs sore from signing numerous posters.Thankfully my manager noticed my tiredness and rushed me to the car, after I bowed in a hasty apology to all the fans I couldn’t greet personally.

Times like these made me feel all the struggles were worth it,and all the love and accolades that were so generously thrown at me justified the years I spent chasing them. Until I realise that the love could turn to spite and accolades to accusations just as quickly as he did all those years ago.

“When will we start shooting?” I asked my manager, once we were comfortably seated and din from outside was substantially reduced.

“The first meeting will be done today, this evening in fact. Your first meeting with your ‘husband’ will, of course, be filmed “