Disclaimer- I don't own Castle, Andrew Marlowe does. Please don't sue me for writing this story! Just having fun playing in the Castle Sandbox! Errors corrected, but I do not have a beta reader, so there's probably typos and dropped words (my apologies). I am not getting into the fandom and making friends for a reason; all my experiences with fandom in the past have brought me friends and some great charity work, but at the same time, incredibly gross and unappealing drama (like having my account hacked. Nice job, right?). I actually had my life threatened by someone once (are you kidding me? It's only fanfiction!). I am never going to fall into that trap again. It's not worth it at all. But the nice people who've reviewed the prequel to this story, I do appreciate you! Thank you!
The Alexis Foundation was set to launch at Christmas time. Dad wanted me to go with him to interviews when the Foundation launched, he wanted my image on the website, and for me to write a short essay and to start writing a blog about my life and eating disorder treatment. Mom was going to run the foundation.
Dad insisted that I buy something new for our onscreen interviews. I was used to buying my clothes from the Goodwill and thrift stores, so Mom and I went on a shopping spree at Forever 21 and I picked out some cute items to wear for the on-screen interviews were were going to do for local stations like New York 1 and CNN.
I had to take off a few mornings at the coffee shop and we had to arrange a few extra baby-sitters for the kids. Dad and I went on to New York 1 at about four in the morning for the wake-up edition. I was scared to death, but this was like an old hat for Dad. He was completely comfortable with the hair and make-up ladies flirting with him. The one I got said, "You have such beautiful skin, sweetheart. Don't ever try to tan."
"Trust me, I don't," I responded. "I sizzle like bacon in the sun. But thanks."
"You're going to be a hit," she promised, dabbing some pressed powder to my nose and forehead. "Just stay calm. Remember that nobody has a perfect interview and that's what makes a person likeable. Just remember to smile and be your beautiful self."
I nodded. "Thank you."
"You're really beautiful," she added. "The world will see that."
I hugged her.
I sat in the greenroom, nervously tapping my foot while Dad charmed the other guests pre- show.
When it was our turn to go out there, I heard Barbara Llewellyn announce us, and the stage manager gave us the cue. The audience started clapping. She hugged and kissed each of us and we settled down on the barstools.
"Welcome to the show," Barbara said. "Richard, we've had you on the show several times, we really enjoy it and if you haven't heard of Richard Castle already, what rock have you been hiding under?"
She laughed and the audience applauded.
"This is the first time we've had your daughter on. Alexis, we're happy to have you."
"Thank you. Thank you for having me," I said, trying to calm down and talk to her like I usually spoke to adults.
"Welcome, welcome," she said, smiling towards the camera. The audience applauded. "Richard, you've got a book coming out, Masked Heat, the sixth and final book in your Nikki Heat series, which is going strong, you've already sold ten million Nikki Heat books, and that's just the Nikki Heat series alone!" The audience applauded again. "But that's not the reason why you're here with your daughter today. You started a project with the Anorexia Nervosa and Associated Disorders Association called the Alexis Foundation."
For a moment, terror overtook me. I was on television talking about something so personal to me, so terrifying, but I took a deep breath. I thought about all the kind fans that had sent me an encouraging comment or two, and all the money they raised. Then, all the people from all over the world who came to my recovery blog to send me and supported me. And the girls I knew from rehab whose families had lost their homes to pay for their treatment. Those families didn't deserve that. I owed them this; I owed the people who'd benefit from the charity my best effort to win people over and get them to donate to help others out.
"Yes, we're here to spread awareness about our charity," I said. "I was diagnosed with anorexia nervosa my freshman year at Columbia. I've been in remission for three and a half years, now, and being able to talk about it on the internet with my dad's readers and other people who've found our story has been a really incredible experience. I want to share that with others who are suffering what I did. I've been in an outpatient program ever since my last experience in inpatient treatment at the Renfrew Center in Pennsylvania, I write my own recovery blog, and I sponsor a few people in OA."
"So tell us some more about the recovery blog you run?" Barbara asked.
"It's Writing my Own Life dot com, a blog I began it after I graduated from Columbia, and I have around thirty thousand readers." The audience applauded me. Most of the thirty thousand that followed it were my Dad's readers anyway. "I got the idea for the name because at one of the lowest points in my illness, I thought, 'I'm being written out of my own life.' I was allow other people to make choices for me, I felt forgotten, I was suicidal. And at one point in my treatment, my therapist said to me, 'why are you letting other people write your story? You're the writer.' And when I got started in recovery, I got this tattoo," I lifted the sleeve of my cardigan to expose my wrist, "it's the ANAD's recovery symbol."
"That's beautiful," Barbara said. This woman made me want to puke in a non-eating disordered way. "What an accomplishment to recover to make a blog that reaches out!"
"My daughter's amazing," Dad added. "And so are my readers."
"A lot of my readers on my blog are Dad's readers too, but we want to expand out with awareness. We've talked about it on the message forums on my dad's website, and we urged them to donate towards the ANAD. Part of the ANAD's mission is to not only find treatment solutions but they also give scholarships towards treatment centers for people who aren't ready to leave inpatient treatment, but they don't have the insurance to cover it. While I was doing inpatient therapy, so many of my fellow patients were more stressed out about pay for treatment than focusing on getting better."
"We never had the problem of paying for treatment. Obviously, I can afford it," Dad said, offering a smile. Barbara practically melted. Ew, barf. Shallow much? "But, good people that we've met as a family, they've said they're going to have to mortgage or sell their family home just to see their children get better. Anorexia's not a disease that people purposely give themselves, and sometimes, insurance doesn't quite do the entire job of treatment. It's quite unfortunate."
"It's not a lifestyle or a diet. It's a lot more than that," I agreed.
"I wish I could have anorexia for a few months!" Barbara said jovially.
"Excuse me?" I said. Bitch!
Dad cast a glance towards me and I saw a forgiving smile on his face. I was ready to jump down this cunt's throat. "You know, that's a misconception. It's not easy to be subjected to this disease. It's something that can't be controlled, it's very isolating, and makes all the things in your life difficult. It's not something you can switch on and off."
"If I had the choice when it first started, I'd have switched it off," I added. "I've subjected my family to an incredible amount of pain and I've cost my father hundreds of thousands of dollars in treatment. If I could reverse it, I would."
"It just goes to show that a number on a scale is not an indicator of happiness. This disease is not really about weight loss," Dad added.
Barbara looked a little flustered. "So, tell us a little more about the Alexis Foundation?"
"I started it after we saw a group of my readers getting online to run a fundraiser for the Nikki Heat movie that's came out a few summers ago. We came out about Alexis' illness on my blog and my readers were so incredibly supportive of her, it was really touching that they did a fundraiser. They've done it with every one of the Nikki Heat and Derrick Storm movies that've been released since. Their goal was to raise about ten-thousand dollars for the ANAD and various eating disorder treatment centers. They auctioned off baked goods, crafts, fanfiction stories, editing services, fan art, you name it. Somebody even donated a week at their vacation home in Florida. And I heard about it, so I started donating signed books and copies of Nikki Heat and Derrick Storm DVDs, and then some of my author friends donated signed copies of their books and movies, like James Patterson, Dennis Lehane, and Alex Connolly, some of the actors from their books' movies, my books' movies, they all donated. They didn't have to do that, but the did, they're real heroes. When the auction was over, my amazing readers- they're great people, honestly- had raised over two-hundred and fifty thousand dollars for the ANAD."
"I was shocked when I heard," I added. "It's amazing, my dad has the best fans. That amount would pay for five people to attend the Renfrew Clinic for a month outside of insurance. When I was at Renfrew, I watched so many patients be admitted but discharged before they were ready because insurance wasn't covering it. An extra month of treatment without having to worry about insurance relieves a lot of fear and stress and gives the patients time to focus on recovery. Eating disorders can kill. I know, I almost died a few times. When we started talking about what these fans had done, I was really impressed with them and their selflessness and sense of charity. I want other people to get this gift of recover I got because my father has money. That's the only special reason I recovered, and I don't feel like it should be a factor for other patients."
"It sure is!" Barbara added. The stage manager was pointing at his wrist and made a motion.
"If you'd like to find out more about the Alexis Foundation, it's the Alexis Foundation dot com, the website is up, it's an accredit 501(c) charity, your donations are tax-deductible," Dad said quickly. "Please, come check it out, Alexis is doing a live video chat on the 15th about recovery and the cost of treatment, we'd love to have you there!"
"Thanks, Richard! We're going to take a commercial break, but when we come back, we're going to have Ingrid Sorensen and her talking dogs! Richard and Alexis, thank you for coming by today. We appreciate you coming by!"
"And clear," the director said. "We're off the air."
Barbara waved over the make-up girl to try to cover up her age spots and started bossing her around, ignoring us.
"Don't you worry," the make-up lady said to me backstage. "We all hate Barbara. And you're brave for getting the guts to talk on television about your illness."
She gave me a hug.
I found myself smiling. It wasn't that terrifying after all.
When we got home, Mom had already posted videos of the interview from youtube to the Alexis Foundation's website and the hits were climbing, money was rolling in. "We're going to need more bandwidth," Dad noted.
After going on the New York 1's Wake Up Edition, the national news networks we did awareness campaigns for were easy. We first guested on several talk shows that were based in New York, including Rachel Ray, where we made Dad's Five-Alarm Chili. It was kind of cool to talk to a foodie-audience about eating disorders, because I had watched Rachel Ray religiously while I was at my sickest, craving what she was cooking and experimenting for others to eat. We talked about how a that was a symptom of eating disorders was someone who loved to cook, but wouldn't eat what I made. I talked about the humiliating experience of holiday dinners where I made a plain green salad while everybody else was enjoying the holiday meal. Rachel Ray was one of the few talk show hosts that didn't seem conceited and was very down-to-earth. Yes, I recognized that so many people with aspirations to become a household name were completely narcissistic, but Rachel never asked questions I wasn't comfortable with sharing. When Rachel asked me about life in recovery, I started talking about my friends and all the things my eating disorder didn't let me do. I talked about how I was such a slave to the gym and running and organizing every calorie. I was miserable. I admitted that even at my lowest weight, I was miserable because I hated myself. I brought up Mom, and admitted that even though she hadn't been in my life as a child, she was my best friend, now. "I call her sometimes and tell her stuff before I tell Dad," I admitted.
"Like what?" Dad cried, surprised. The audience thought that was hysterical. "You never told me this!"
Dad and I seemed to have a reparte and chemistry that viewers loved. Dad's PR manager even pointed out that we were on the short list for replacing Michael and Kelly on Live if they ever needed a break. I didn't like the idea of going into performing for a living.
My blog readers, Instagram, and Twitter followers shot through the roof in the next few weeks; I had over a hundred thousand by the time we left to do appearances on non-New York shows. We traveled the country to Philadelphia, Chicago, Los Angeles, and Atlanta, and made appearances to promote the charity. I had offers to do a memoir from major publishing houses, but I just wasn't ready to do that just yet. I wanted to get my foot in the door based on talent, not birth. I also had to watch what I said on my social networks.
Surprisingly, Dad's reputation had changed from party-animal overgrown frat boy since I had posted my letter on his website three years ago. Dad was now being recognized for being a father. Most people forgot about that when they spoke about him in the past. Since I had come out about my eating disorder, now, they looked up to him as something much more respectable and wise. It had been a real push from his PR team to bring me out into the spotlight.
When my live discussion went on, the techie guy who did our site set up the laptop for live video chat in Dad's office. It was mostly supposed to be me, but Noel, Jace, and Jo-jo wanted to say hi to everybody before bed. I let them say hi in their jammies before sending them to bed. The chat room participants through the roof when they made their appearance. The first live chat went very well.
As for my novel writing, Harper Rodgers had a few requests to read from agents, but they rejected my work after all was said and done. I started going dancing a few nights a week with my girlfriends at the nightclubs in Manhattan so I didn't fall into the stereotype of a literary agent or writer who liked tea and had a cat. I also went to keep my spirits up; novel rejections can be quite intimidating. We ran around with men that were in the same situation as us; trying to break even, but pursue their dreams, too. After a while, I ended up taking one of them home. His name was Daniel, he worked as an intern for a literary contracting office, he had gone to law school at SUNY. It was just time to have sex again with somebody new for me. He was kind of like an earthquake on top of me when we had sex and I ended up laying there unentertained. We used a condom, and he got dressed and left right afterwards, kissing me good-bye. I didn't feel anything like regret or any attachment to him. I just wanted something other than my vibrator for once and he was into me. I ran into him a week later, and didn't feel anything else towards him other than that he was a friend. A few days later, Daniel called me, asking if I just wanted to get together to fuck and I said yes. Daniel was officially my booty call and fuck buddy. I never thought I'd lower myself to have one when I was in high school or college (oh my God, it's so slutty! Nooo!), but I did, now.
I tried to ignore the whole story about Ben's success that I kept on reading about in all my newsletters about the industry and I tried to bury that disastrous memory of the Mermaid Parade Ball. I buried myself in my work, too. It was nice to not have to worry about keeping up a relationship. The emotional part wasn't there, and I liked that.
In the Spring, Mom and I ran the Boston marathon to celebrate the Alexis Foundation having raised over two million in treatment center scholarships. We came home the next day and I went with my girlfriends to Times Square after I recovered to celebrate. I was a bit startled when I ran into Ben- literally.
"Alexis?" he asked. He had the squints he was so drunk.
"Hi," I said, suddenly unable to think of anything else to say. It still humiliated me that he lied to me. I was someone he should have been able to trust. At least, he built me up to feel that way. I had been prepared for him to be honest with me, but he took the quick route out. I hadn't done that with him. I had made my emotions completely at his mercy. He knew shit about me that I didn't feel that he could be that vulnerable with me, too. I wanted to know that there was one person in the world that could protect me and accept my faults and insecurities. That's what made me mad. It made me furious that I had opened up to him so much and trusted him, but he couldn't do the same, despite saying I was special and that he loved me. I wanted to make him mad back. Just to see if I could get to that part of him that could be hurt, just to know that he wasn't a complete stone on the inside that had said and done things to use me for sex and to pay half his rent.
"What are you doing here?" he asked.
"Um... partying?" I answered. "I just ran the Boston Marathon and finished."
"Again?"
"Uh, yeah," I said, finally recovering my sarcasm. "None of my friends run full marathons."
"I was trying to just talk with you," he said.
"Well, you were a douchebag," I spat out. I had had a little to drink already, and he wasn't apologizing. "You always have been! And you still can't apologize!"
"Me? Apologize?" he snapped. He had been drinking, too. "You sent me a shitty text message and left me the mother of all voicemails, calling me dickless? I think we're about even, now."
"Even?" I snarled. "Even? You can't even begin to imagine how much you hurt me! That drunk dial and text message didn't even come close to making us even after you lied!"
"Why don't you go find your daddy and ask him to get you a ghost writer to get you published if you're so fucking jealous?"
"Go fuck your drunken self if you think I'm jealous!" His eyes narrowed and I felt my pride and my drunken tongue come back full-force. Had I been sober, I'd have walked away like a lady, but that night, I didn't. "I'm fucking somebody else, now. And it's so much better than anything I ever had with you."
He flung his glass down on the polished concrete floor, shattering it. Something bit into my leg in a few spots, probably broken glass bits. I didn't break his gaze. He glared at me for a moment, and walked away.
So what? He was probably already trashed.
When I got back to Astoria that night, I had sobered up a bit on the train. This was the third time, if you counted the drunk text and the drunk dial as two separate events, that I had insulted his virility. But then, he insulted my father and me, indicating that my father could get me published without me working hard at all on my manuscript. I didn't need a fucking ghost writer, and I didn't need my father to buy one for me. I was going to do it just the same as him. He didn't even know about the publishing industry until we had started hanging out! I had to educate him, that bastard! He'd be published with some shitty self-publishing service if I hadn't informed him on the process! I even helped him craft his query letter!
In my room, I picked out the shards of glass that had lodged themselves into my shins. Picking up my phone, I considered it. Then, I dialed Daniel.
