She’ll barely even have to edit it. Cecily looks that good.
Cecily coughs. Amber snaps pictures. Cecily continues to cough. It sounds like she’s dying.
“Done,” Amber says finally, exiting the camera app and opening her editing software. This will have to be a low-key edit on one of the half-dozen photography apps she has installed on her phone; they do have a party to get back to, after all. Even though her mother probably would consider Amber’s disappearance to edit photos for the rest of the night a worthy sacrifice, she thinks, suppressing an eye roll. She can hear her mother’s voice in her head: Your sister’s on the rise! We have to help her all we can! But does that really mean that Amber has to go from being in every other photo, to every fifth photo, to a rare group shot? Or does her mother really think that the best use of Amber’s time is editing Cecily into perfection?
Faster than Amber can blink, Cecily slumps out of photo posture and dumps today’s sponsored product—some kind of energy tea—into a nearby shrub. A flask appears in her hand as if by magic, and she refills her cup with a generous splash of gin. Rudy gets the flask next. He takes a pull and passes it to Amber, who waves him off. She’s hunched over her phone, busy applying filters, facetune, and color correction to fix Cecily. Bring out the green tones in her blue eyes, erase her almost-nonexistent pores, accentuate the curves of her cocktail dress. When she finishes, she’s staring at a perfect version of her sister. And if Cecily is already the perfect version of Amber, then that makes this facetuned stunner double perfect. “Caption,” she says, holding her phone screen out for her brother and sister to see.
“You know what they say about Instagram captions,” Cecily quips, wiggling the flask in front of her sister’s face. “Write drunk, edit sober.”
“Oh,” Rudy says. “I thought they said to use as many emojis as possible.”
“Guys, this is serious,” Amber says. Rudy snorts.
Her sister swipes the phone from Amber’s hand and starts typing. “Here: how about, Never sorry to soiree—Happy 20th, Mom and Dad. Here’s to our newest project.”
“Don’t forget to—”
“I’m going to add the sponsors. Sheesh, you’re starting to sound like Mom,” Cecily mutters, leaning back to hold the phone out of her sister’s reach. Amber is annoyed, but the feeling passes quickly. It’s hard to stay mad at Cecily. Cecily, the up-and-coming beauty guru. Perfect Cecily, who genuinely believes that makeup is about confidence, about feeling beautiful, not just beauty itself. Of course, that’s easy for her to say.
Amber supposes that, in another world, she would be in front of the camera 24/7 with her sister, not behind it—if, of course, she were about twelve sizes smaller. Even though she shares Cecily’s dimples, perfect teeth, and loose, wavy hair, on Instagram it seems like the only thing that matters is her size. Online, size eighteen doesn’t exactly pull followers—or at least, that’s what Mom had hinted as she slowly edged Amber out of their posts. So Amber has been using her once-vlog-worthy knowledge of the latest fashion trends to help dress the family in between shooting and editing photos of her siblings. Lately, she appears in the occasional group shot. A quick acknowledgment of the camera girl.
Not for the first time, Amber wonders how she went from being one of a trio to being behind the scenes. Of course, she knows why: engagement. But just because her mother thinks that their Cecily- and Rudy-centric posts perform better doesn’t mean that Amber likes being pushed to the background. Or that it doesn’t hurt.
Amber is jolted out of her thoughts by Cecily shaking the flask in front of her face. “Come on, loosen up.” She hands the phone back to Amber, who adds one more line before posting the photo with a caption: Staying fit this summer with @BoostEnergy. #mansion #renovation #soiree #summer #coletriplets #tripletsofinstagram.
“There, you posted it,” Cecily says, looping her arm through Amber’s. “Can we just have fun now?”
“Hey, I was always having fun,” Rudy cuts in. Amber rolls her eyes and finally takes the flask, filling her glass halfway to the top.
“To the move,” Rudy says.
“To being done with work for the rest of this stupid party,” Amber adds.
“To our careers,” Cecily says. “One million followers, here we come.” She shoots her siblings a playful wink. “Don’t worry, I won’t forget you when I’m a famous beauty guru.”
On Instagram, Cecily’s perfect laugh and evening makeup are broadcasted to the hundreds of thousands of users following the Cole triplets under their account name @ColeTripsHouseFlips. The post includes three other pictures to please the algorithm: one of the three siblings an hour ago, taken by Mom; another of Rudy, flexing next to a pyramid of hors d’oeuvres; and another of the house they’re partying at—the one they’re about to leave.
The three-million-dollar McMansion is the latest in a long line of opulent houses that Cole Family Realty has bought, remodeled, and resold for double the price. The downstairs is decked out in splendor for Mr. and Mrs. Cole’s twentieth-anniversary party, all string lights, pricey decor, and fragile tchotchkes. Upstairs, the rooms are bare. All of Amber’s electronics and clothes are packed away. Tomorrow, they will move on to the next fixer-upper. Amber can’t complain; sure, moving all the time sucks, but it means a new mansion to play in every few months, and that means a fresh stream of the content that makes the triplets famous. Before and after pictures. Luxury estates. Designer clothes. A window into the life of the rich and richer. Their followers eat it up.
Amber massages her temples with one hand; she’d spent all afternoon editing posts and her head is buzzing from the screen time. But it’ll all be worth it when the likes and comments start coming in. The Cole Patrol—their
