When she finally decided to emerge from her bed, she had no idea what time it was. It had been hours since she woke up, all the tossing and turning in the world wasn't putting her back to sleep, and her thoughts had turned irrevocably towards him. It's the hunger that finally does it - the pains in her stomach have been a welcome distraction from the thoughts she is no longer supposed to think ("His birthday's next week," "I wonder if his parents will notice if I move into the RV over break"), but it's too much. And there was the small matter that she had no idea how long it's been since she ate, drank, showered, or paid any attention to the small mountain of audition materials on her desk.
She stumbled to the kitchen, ignoring the stares, deflecting the questions of her roommates, as concisely and sardonically as possible. She supposes she should feel bad for them - after all, they didn't sign up to live with a lump under the covers that requires constant darkness. But empathy was never her strong suit and the blatant judgement on their faces deserved every inconvenience she could throw at them.
Her shelf in the pantry was sparse - coffee, canned peas, canned tuna, and pretzels. The coffee was tempting, but she really didn't want to be awake. She went for the tuna, it had literally been years since she last had it - the three for one pack was an impulse buy a few months ago. Rummaging in the fridge produces an older package of blackberries. She carried it all back to her room, clumsy shutting the door behind her, and dumping it all on the desk.
The tuna tasted like tuna - tinny, fishy, cheap. She remembers exactly why she added it to the list of things she hates back in high school, but finished the entire tin in spite of herself. The blackberries looked okay, but tasted a bit off. She finished the entire package anyway, they still had an aftertaste of summer and California and if she got food poisoning, it would mean an excuse for a few days off. She wanted more, but that would mean facing the roommates again. She only had so many comebacks and she was so tired.
She vaguely thought about looking at the audition materials. One semester in, she had scored a leading role and an agent and promises that she was beautiful and talented and going to be the next big thing. She smirked as they told her everything she already knew, but couldn't help being practically giddy as she told him that night.
It was then when it started, really. There was a knock at his door and then there was her.
"Does she routinely spend time in your room?" she spat, all traces of a good mood evaporated.
"Chill, we live on the same hall."
"And it hasn't occurred to you to tell me that?"
She demanded that Tori Vega leave his room right now. He rolled his eyes and told her to go, it would only take a few minutes. She bristled at that implication, but it was the same fight they had had a million times before. And would have a million times more.
When schools in New York gave her a full scholarship and he was already committed to staying in LA, they agreed they could handle long-distance. They'd been together for four years, they understood each other better than anyone else, colleges had long breaks, they would be fine.
They weren't. She had always let her jealously ruin her - but the questions of why he was with her when he had girls throwing himself at him all the time never faded. The fights, him screaming at her to trust him and her never being quite able to, got worse when there were 3000 miles and a 3 hour time difference between them. His understanding waned as they got older - "I've been with you forever," he would yell, "If I wanted to leave, don't you think I would have by now?"
It made sense to her in the moment, she would cry, they would make up. But she could never stop herself the next time. And without those moments in the dead of night in his RV when they could just be them, she kept getting pettier and he kept getting angrier until he had finally had enough.
As she ate her hated tuna, she flipped through old Slap photos of the two of them. She had no idea why she still looked at them or why she doesn't just delete them or why he doesn't just delete them - especially now that she's been replaced. She flips over to his profile and one glance at the two of them together was enough to make her want to forget, crawl under the covers, and sleep until she forgets everything. Not that she hadn't been doing that for months.
When he changed his relationship status from single to in a relationship with her, she instantly felt vindicated - she had been right all along. But it didn't seem that simple as she flipped through the photos of them together in the California sun while she sat, eating her tuna and blackberries in a freezing New York winter.
She missed him. She needed him. She would never admit it.
She was throwing away every chance she had at success.
So she piled her dishes on the desk, hoped the room wouldn't reek of tuna in the morning, and crawled back under the covers, vowing that tomorrow she would wake up, shower, and handle the auditions. And that one day, he would see her on a billboard, on a giant movie screen, in a magazine, somewhere where she was utterly unobtainable and perfect and realize everything he was missing.