Exhibit 8

Wednesday morning was the morning of the Darling shoot.

Mom woke both Caroline and I up, early, so that we could get ready. When mom came into my room she let her hand gently stroke my arm until I groggily awoke and noticed her presence in my room, hovering above me. I turned on my side to glance up at her, surprised to find her staring down at me, her eyes, at least in the dark, looked caring, compassionate.

"Caroline! You'd better be out of bed or else I'm taking your phone away." My mother yelled, surprising me, for her eyes were still focused, almost lovingly, on me; her hand was still gently running up and down my arm. She leaned down and pressed a kiss to my cheek. "Are you awake? You two have to leave in forty-five minutes."

I frowned up at her, wondering where this soft tone had come from. I nodded up at her.

Was she trying to make up for the morning before?

"All right, well get out of bed. Go brush your teeth. I'll have Manuela make your breakfast. Do you want cantaloupe or watermelon?"

"Cantaloupe," I hazily replied, sitting up in bed.

"All right. Out of bed. Let's go." And with that she disappeared out of my room.

That was the strangest interaction to date, I do believe.

~*~

Ann was standing to the side of the studio, completely wrapped up in a huge pink feather boa, overseeing her workers as they pulled together outfits. Everyone was running around, trying to get last minute details in place. No one noticed when we stepped inside the studio's doors; everyone was consumed with their tasks for the morning, but I had a feeling none of them would last long under my mother's employ. They looked entirely too lax about everything.

I pulled my Dolce and Gabbana sunglasses off my blue eyes and surveyed the scene, my sister doing the same at my side.

When everyone realized we had arrived, the running around seemed to cease and Ann moved towards us.

"Girls!" She exclaimed, leaning in to air kiss both of us. "Now which one is which?"

"I'm Caroline." My sister stuck out her hand. I was glad we looked rather different today. She had chosen skinny, bright green jeans with a striped black and white shirt complete with Chanel necklaces, and I had on Chip n' Pepper jeans with a burnt orange and white striped shirt under a cream cardigan.

Ann could very well tell us apart for now, "I'm Cassidy." I extended my hand.

"Wonderful, well let's get you over to Jason. He's going to do your make-up and then we'll get you into the clothes." She explained, giving us a once over and I knew she was picking outfits out for us with her eyes. She knew exactly what she wanted.

We were whisked away and in no time my hair was teased higher than a bad model in the 80's. My sister had some sleek, tousled look. Our outfits were absolutely ridiculous but exactly what only fashion could get away with. I wondered, briefly, if our mother would approve.

But these...costumes...were completely not anything she would ever include in Runway. Ann had once costumed for Broadway shows and thus she had a theatrical flair to her outfits. My sister seemed to like them well enough, and oddly, as we glanced through some takes after we'd shot for an hour, we looked good in the clothes.

Noon came all too soon and our mother was nowhere to be seen. She had promised to be there before we wrapped. She had promised Ann she would stop in and check on us, but by 12:36 it looked as if she might never show up.

However, at exactly 12:40 on the dot our mother made her entrance. Everyone seemed to lose their mind when mom stepped inside the studio. The gays fawned over her, and everyone else just stared at her in awe.

I studied her from my spot in front of the camera and realized that she looked vaguely distracted.

She exchanged some brief words with Ann before crossing her arms over her chest and watching as we took photos. I began to get uneasy under her scrutinizing glare, but I held it together.

Besides something seemed off about her. She looked more ruffled that she had this morning, as if she'd just been pulling her hair out at work while rolling around on the floor. Her hair was slightly unkempt and her cardigan under her tan trench coat looked rather tangled. Though on the outside she was the picture of perfection. No one noticed these oddities except me.

When we were told to go change into the last set of clothes, mom came over to us.

"Who let you wear your hair like this?" She asked, mindlessly running her hand through my hairspray laden hair, silently disapproving.

"It was the look they were going for." I exclaimed, slipping out of the pants they had put me in. One of the workers handed over a bright pink and green stripped mini-skirt and some purple tights to go with. My mother pursed her lips. She hated it, but she wouldn't say anything. I grinned in her direction, knowing she was quietly disapproving of every piece of clothing in the room. "Why were you late?" I whispered in her direction and she fixed me with quite the glare.

"A meeting came up." Lies.

She was lying again. Normally everything was clear when it came to my sister and I. She had hardly ever been late to any of our events or appointments, but here she was lying about a meeting.

And then I noticed her lipstick looked rather...well smeared?

Oh. My. God.

Who was she carrying this relationship on with? Why was she hiding it from us?

I just nodded in her direction and followed my sister back to the now pale grey background in front of the camera.

~*~

After one last set of photographs Ann thanked us profusely and then we headed out behind our mother.

She seemed distracted and was busy typing away on her blackberry. "Well girls, you had better get to Dalton so that you can finish the rest of the day."

"Aw, mom. Can't we go get some food or something?" Caroline whined, which usually never worked on my mom, but instead she nodded.

"Where?" She asked, almost surprised by her own response.

"212?" I quickly suggested, realizing that sushi sounded really good right now.

This was so weird! We never just had lunch with our mom. This moment was actually quite cool.

"Fukumatsu?" Our mom frowned.

"Yes." I nodded and she nodded her approval. We all slipped into the back of her town car, Roy saying his 'hello' to us as our mom dialed her office, barking orders to one of her assistants, instructing her to clear her another hour.

Caroline and I exchanged excited grins. The only other time this had happened on such short notice had been when Caroline had broken her arm and mom had cleared her afternoon so we could go out to eat after Caroline got her cast put on. It had been ages.

As soon as mom hung up her phone, she began rapidly texting someone. I did hope this texting would end so we could all enjoy one another at the restaurant.

When we got to 212 Fukumatsu, we were seated in the back, away from the viewing public. However, we were not missed by the paparazzi that had somehow found us in the front. It surprised me to no end that people were actually paid to go trapezing through the city and snap pictures of people doing normal, everyday, mundane things such as going out to eat. No doubt there would be an article in Page Six tomorrow, detailing our lunch with our mother.

Mom continued to text as we ordered our drinks, and then put her phone away, knowing that she would not want either of us texting. She seemed, on the outside, busy and preoccupied with work, but in the car I'd noticed her smirk one too many times at the texts someone was sending her to know that it was not work related at all. I would bet quite a bit that the person on the other end was her secret lover.

I wished I could just outright ask her who it was, but I knew she wouldn't say.

She would undoubtedly not tell us until it was about to come out in the papers and then she'd break it to us as if we had no idea she was carrying on like this.

But there was something different about this affair. She had never looked so happy about having someone else. Not since...well...ever really.

Sushi was ordered and we fell into a nice chat about a huge event that was coming up several weeks from now. Caroline and I had been asked to a huge soiree the following weekend. We had a feeling that dad wouldn't come get us, so it was safe to accept the invitation and go.

Our busy social calendar rarely left us time to sit and dawdle and I believe that our mother liked it that way. She liked when we were busy; and perhaps now she liked it even more because she had her own private affair to attend to.

In a stroke of genius, I brought up the whole secret affair in a roundabout way. "Hey, Care, are you still with Mark?" I asked, my finger running around the rim of my water glass.

Caroline glanced up from her sushi and frowned at me. "No, we broke up last week." She shrugged. I knew that my sister was never serious about her boyfriends. They came and went like the newest trends. One day they were in, the next day they were out.

Our mother perked up at the sound of this conversation, clearly having never heard anything about Mark. She never really asked about our personal lives.

"What about Graham, Cass, how is he?" Caroline retorted, swirling her eel roll in soy sauce.

"Graham is gay. We are not dating." I stuck my tongue out at her and glanced sideways at my mother to see her reaction.

She raised her eyebrow slightly, but other than that she did not react to my declamation about Graham's sexuality.

"Is Graham the boy who came...last weekend?" She asked, attempting to sound interested.

"Yes, he's the one whose mother used to work in Florida and then she got a job transfer to an ER up here in New York, but she's never around."

My mother's eye-widened and she nodded her head, perplexed by the fact that I had just divulged too many details. She could care less about Graham's mother. Turning to Caroline, she frowned, "I don't like you 'dating' boys. You're too young."

"Oh, mom. I'm not like serious, serious about boys." Caroline rolled her eyes and I stifled a laugh. When my sister was 'dating' a boy she was all about said boy, completely obsessed.

"Good. Boys want one thing and one thing only and you should never let them have it." Our mom pointed her chopsticks in my sister's direction and Caroline raised her eyebrows in surprise that my mother was giving her this unsolicited advice. "They're utterly good for nothing." Our mother added under her breath.

Caroline and I exchanged a look and then quickly went back to eating.

"How about you, mom. Anyone of interest?" I asked, attempting to sound cool, calm, and casual.

Caroline shoved her foot against my shin under the table and I suppressed the urge to yelp.

A quick look of terror flashed behind my mother's calm, blue eyes and she stalled by dabbing the corner of her mouth with her napkin. "Not at this time, no."

Lies.

All she did was lie about it, all the time. "What about the other morning, when you came-"

"We will not discuss that morning, Cassidy." My mother tossed down her chopsticks. She was ready to leave, to escape this discussion. She waved a waiter down and handed him her card.

Caroline and I fell immediately silent and no words were exchanged for the rest of our tenure at 212 Fukumatsu.

~*~

"What was with mom at the restaurant and what happened the other morning'?" Caroline immediately asked when we were safely inside the townhouse and our mom was driving back to work.

"Well...I was up early the other morning and...remember how we watched mom get ready that one night and she had that Vera Wang dress on....well the other morning she came through the back door wearing that same dress."

"So..." Caroline wasn't quite following.

"So." I willed her to come to my line of thinking, but she did not.

"So, she was out fucking some guy. What's the big deal?" Caroline shrugged, dropping her purse on the huge mahogany table near the newly cut fresh flowers in a vase and headed towards the kitchen and to the back stairway.

"It is a big deal, she wouldn't acknowledge it or talk about it and she's been sneaking around with whoever this is. Normally she goes out on dates, but remember that night she didn't leave with anyone. Usually the guy always picks her up here." I was rambling, but the pieces were beginning to fall together in my brain.

"Well, maybe she's fucking a woman. Who knows?" Caroline sounded uninterested. Still.

And then it dawned on me. "I think she is. Oh. My. God."

And that got my sister's attention. "Who would she be secretly fucking that's female?"

"Um...maybe..." I had no idea who it...or maybe I did. "Andy Sachs."

"What?" My sister turned around and looked at me like I was crazy. "No fucking way. Absolutely not. Mom would never fuck her."

"But I mean it's so obvious."

"How?" Caroline wanted facts.

"Well...I caught mom reading an article Andy had written." I proudly stated and my sister just stared at me like I was mentally challenged.

"That means absolutely nothing, Cassidy." She turned again and walked into her room; we had somehow made it to the fourth floor and I didn't recall the arduous climb at all.

"Well why would she subscribe to The New York Mirror then if not to see Andy's article?" I knew my defense was weak.

"Maybe she wants to catch up on the hardcore news here in New York; there are plenty of other explanations, Cass." Caroline sighed, opening up her laptop.

"Oh, okay...well remember that bracelet? The one I found in the backseat of her car?"

Caroline frowned, vaguely recalling the bracelet that had become the center of our dinner one evening. "Yes, what about it?"

"It belongs to Andy." The words exited my mouth before I suddenly realized I'd pieced that little bit of evidence together unconsciously.

"You can't prove that." Caroline was still not convinced.

But then I got it. "Yes I can." I raced down a flight of stairs and into my room. My MacBook was open and I touched it to bring it back to life.

I turned to take it to my sister, but I found she'd followed me down the stairs. So I sat down on my bed and she followed suit. I pulled up my picture files and began clicking through until I came to the picture of Andy with her son. There, on her left wrist, was a silver looking bracelet.

"That's not really like the same one though..." Caroline marveled at the picture.

I quickly sectioned off the wrist area and enlarged just that part of the picture. And then I knew. It was the exact same bracelet.

"Well...so. Maybe she like...gave her a ride, or something." But even Caroline was running out of excuses for our mother.

We sat in silence for several moments, contemplating what to do next.

"Well...we don't know. I mean..."

"We shouldn't..."

"Yeah because then she'd..."

"And we don't..."

"So we'll just...

"Um...yeah."

We looked at one another again and frowned.

"But she has a baby."

"He's not really a baby."

"Well no, but..."

"And she's engaged..."

"I know, but that doesn't..."

"Well, I know, but..."

"I still don't know."

"Me either."

"Fuck."

"Yeah."