Love you,
Grandma
AS far as I could tell, Sam and Roland kept their word and didn’t tell anyone my Ana Arias theory. Roland didn’t even tease me about it, although I suspected that had less to do with believing me, and more to do with Sam bringing up Ellie, whoever she was. Either way, I was determined to prove Roland wrong. It was just stage fright. And stage fright didn’t include hallucinating ghosts and messages on cave walls. Ana had followed me, and I wanted to figure out why.
I felt guilty for not telling Oscar. Back in Rotterdam, I’d confided in him about seeing Sonja Hillebrandt’s ghost, and he and I didn’t even like each other then. But I still just didn’t trust him not to go straight to Jess to try to get us even more screen time.
What made me feel even worse was that this whole Ana thing probably would be good for the show. Emily might have been the reason the last episode got so much publicity, but viewers were interested in the Red Leer part, too. If another ghost was “haunting” the show, the fans would eat it up. That’s why I kept telling myself that as soon as I got my stupid stage fright under control, I would go to Jess and tell her everything.
In the meantime, Oscar was spending more and more time on the P2P message boards. He gave me constant updates about anything and everything that the fans said about either of us, despite me repeatedly telling him I didn’t care. If there were any rude comments about me, Oscar didn’t mention them, and I resisted the urge to look. Because when I checked my last post the night we got back from camping, I’d found another comment from the same troll.
kbold04: deleting my comment doesnt change the fact that ur UGLLYYYYYYY
I deleted it, of course. But not before taking a screenshot. Then I’d gone to my blog settings and changed it so that no comments would be published until I approved them. It would be kind of annoying to keep up with, but better than everybody seeing everything this person said about me.
On our last night in Salvador, Dad and the rest of the crew went out for a celebratory dinner after three intense days of editing the waterfall episode. Oscar and I had opted for celebratory pizza and ice pops at the hotel after three intense days of cramming in schoolwork.
“How much do you think we’ll actually be in the episode?” Oscar asked, grabbing another maracujá ice pop from the freezer. I made a face.
“Hopefully not much.” I’d secretly been hoping Jess would edit us out completely, but no such luck. Yesterday she’d even stopped by after lunch just to tell me and Oscar how great we were. Even Roland seemed pleased with how the episode was turning out.
Oscar ignored my comment. “I hope they use the part where Roland and I found that cold spot. I don’t think you were there for that—you went off with Brenda.”
“Yeah.” I tossed my ice pop stick in the trash can next to the bed. “Did I tell you I checked out that cave behind the waterfall?” I said it as casually as possible, even though the memory caused the hairs on the back of my neck to stand up. I WANT OUT. I wanted to tell Oscar about it. I had to. Maybe he was all caught up in this TV stuff, but he was still my friend. I could trust him.
“Really?” He sat up. “Oh man, we should’ve tried the Ouija board there.”
I blinked. “What?”
“In the cave.” Oscar pointed his ice pop at my camera sitting on the desk. “We could’ve shot another video.”
“Why would we do that?” I said, trying not to sound too irritated. “The Flavia video was just so Jess could see if we’d be okay on the show.”
“Yeah, but think about it.” Oscar leaned forward eagerly. “Everyone loved it, even Fright TV. We could make it like a web series! A new video before every episode.”
“No, thanks.”
“Why not?”
“My blog’s enough work already,” I said shortly. “Not interested.”
Oscar sighed. “Look, if it’s that you’re afraid of being on camera, I’ll do that part and you can just do the research.”
“I’m not afraid,” I snapped, standing up and grabbing my camera. “For your information, that research takes a lot of time. Besides, you’re already going to be on TV. Do you really need a web series, too?”
Oscar rolled his eyes. “It’s not about me, Kat. This would be good for the show. But if you don’t want to do it, fine.”
“I don’t want to do it.”
“Fine.” He opened his laptop without another word. I left him glued to the fan forums and stalked back to my room, fuming the whole way. Afraid of being on camera. That had stung, because it was true. Apparently everyone could tell. If I was going to get over my stage fright, I’d have to take Grandma’s advice.
“Okay.” Carefully, I set my Elapse on top of the TV so it was about eye level, and flipped it on. Taking a few steps back, I attempted to smile at it. But my skin was already starting to crawl, and my stomach squirmed unpleasantly.
“No one’s going to see this,” I told the camera. “Ever. This is just for practice. You’re going to burn this memory card. You’re going to break it in half and throw it into the ocean. You’re going to put it in a blender then flush it down the toilet. No one will ever see this, no one will ever watch you talking to yourself, so just. Freaking. Relax.”
But it wasn’t working. If anything, my anxiety doubled. Scowling, I reached out and flipped the camera off. Almost immediately, my pulse began to
