Leaving an everlasting impression was a key to success, only if one didn't try hard to do it. She altered her theory a little bit.

**************

Kayden woke up with renewed confidence and with a productive feeling as if she had something to do today.

She was starting the shooting of her film Stars Aligned today. She was excited to work with the director of this film, Pablo Lorenzo. He was a seven-time academy award winner and a twelve-time nominee. This was once in a lifetime offer.

Her past self would be trying to come up with ways to impress him because the younger Kayden thought that leaving an everlasting impression was the key to success.

Leaving an everlasting impression was a key to success, only if one didn't try hard to do it. She altered her theory a little bit. Now she would find ways to hone her art to perfection and leaving an everlasting impression was not a chore anymore. It came spontaneously.

That's all she had to do for this film, she wasn't going to try to impress him, she was just going to perform her art to the best of her capabilities. She was going to do everything that the director told, but better.

With her hopes soaring through the sky and her self-esteem plummeting as high as Everest, she was ready to beat her best self to date, to become even a better self.

It was nine am by the time she got ready. She didn't have to wait for breakfast, because that was always brought to her by Van and she would always do it in her car.

She heard the honking of the car from outside which implied that Van was there.

She grabbed her keys and locked her apartment. Some photographers were waiting to take her picture.

She smiled for the cameras and waved at them. The photographers had been nice to her, mostly. They would keep their distance and sometimes they would wish her Good morning and she would too.

Most of the time, they didn't trouble her a lot.

"Kayden, can you please walk slowly so we can take your pictures," one photographer said to her.

She nodded her head and smiled at him. He was a middle-aged man. She stopped for some time and struck a few poses.

Van came behind her and calmly told the photographers to stay behind. He checked with extreme vigilance if somebody tried to make any kind of move. He opened the door for Kayden to enter.

Kayden saw that Van had opened the door. She took that as an indication that it was getting late. She politely waved bye to all the photographers.

"Have a nice day, Kay," some photographers murmured.

She got inside her car and saw a plate of waffles, with syrup and fruits, kept on the table already in the car. She picked up the package and started eating it.

"Thanks, Van. You never forget," she said to him.

"That's what you pay me for," replied Van, looking at her from the mirror.

" You do a lot more for me," Kayden said to him. She felt very chatty after her phone call with her mom yesterday. Some walls that she had built around her like she was trying to protect her soul, she had isolated herself from human connection, had finally broken. Now she was allowing her soul to be free.

She was adding something to her life like her mom had told her to.

Van was also shocked to hear her talking. She never said more than what was necessary.

"Why do you do so much for me, Van?" She asks him again.

Van hadn't been able to come out of the shock but he still managed to answer.

" My daughter's your age you know. I see her going through so many troubles. And then I stay with you the whole day, I know what happens each day in your life thoroughly. And then there could be a possibility that tomorrow I'll wake up and there will be a bullshit article written about you. And I become so shocked, like how can you live like that? Such false information. But you get out of your house, dressed up and confident, go to your work, act the hell out of your character, and then win praises for it without shedding one tear or one cry or even uttering one complaint from your mouth," Van said to her.

" Quite impressive, right?" She raised an eyebrow and smiled and she took her package of waffles between her hands and moved to lean forwards in between both the seats.

" No. It's fucking lonely," Van admitted.

When he said it, she felt cold to her gut. She felt completely numbed at his words. She felt angry, miserable, and a whole lot of sadness.

" Excuse me," she said, poking at her waffles. She couldn't look up at him and face looking him in the eyes.

" You sit in this car every time and look with those sad blue eyes of yours, outside at the world. Begging for help. If eyes could talk Kayden, your eyes would be screaming. You beg this changing world silently, to help you. To help you escape this trapped situation that you have created for yourself. It's all your own doing. Yeah, some things you don't have control over. But something's you can control. But you need to figure it out by yourself," Van said.

" You seem frustrated," Kayden spoke up, trying to change the muse of conversation.

" Yeah. I'm sad that is your life as a girl. I worry about my girls. You're like a daughter to me too, even if I'm just your bodyguard. I care about you as I care about them and that makes me worry about them too. Your generation's life is hard. You're too stuffed up in your lives. You guys are tying your souls with the tightest noose and then asking it to breathe. Taking the hardest challenges and then expecting to get happiness in return. None of you wants to work for happiness. All of you are fucking machines," as Van kept on talking, he grew frustrated with each word he said.

That made her wonder, is that how her mother felt when she saw her suffer? Van was right, she never imagined how it was for her parents to be living in this generation. It was weird for her, but turns out it was weirder for her parents.

Were these the types of conversations they had with each other when they talked about her?

She didn't want to be this girl that Van described. She didn't want her parents to think about this sad, miserable girl that Van just described.

Van was right about everything.

She looked up into the mirror and made eye contact with him and said, " you don't have to worry about your daughters, because they have you as a dad and this daughter of yours promises to let her soul loose and a wonderful fact, she already has. Look I talked to you so much today, I haven't talked to you so much in the ten years that you've known me."

Van erupted into a burst of wholehearted laughter upon hearing her words.

Making somebody laugh was such a beautiful feeling but making somebody your parent's age laugh was a whole new feeling.

So beautiful.

She needed to add more of this to her life. This made her feel positive and full of hope.

" Here we are," she said as she saw the signboard of P.L Stars Aligned. This was the set that they had specially constructed for this film. Pablo, always designed all his sets by himself and he worked fast on a film because these sets had to be dismantled soon before they started being a problem for the local public.

She got out of the car. Her feet moved fast with the excitement of wanting to look at the insides of the set.

A commotion began on the set as everybody saw her walking towards Pablo. Nobody ever did. She knew that because she had heard her colleagues say so much about Pablo.

It was always him calling them, and then they would go to talk to him but not Kayden.

If Kayden wanted to talk to the director then, she would.

Everybody kept muttering here and there, probably hoping that she would turn around and wait till the director called her.

"Hello Mr. Pablo," she said to the director. Pablo was a bald, middle-aged, medium heightened man, more on the taller side. He wore a black sweater and glassy shade trousers. He wore spectacles. He carried a folder of papers, probably the script of the film.

He looked at her for a minute, genuinely stunned that she came all the way to talk to him.

He smiled at her as he recovered from his state, "hey Kayden. It's so great to meet you for the first time. Excited for the first scene, just waiting for Austin to get here."

" Yes. I checked upon him and he's gonna be here in five minutes," Kayden answered.

" Come on, I'll show you around the set, just helping you familiarize yourself with the places where you'll be shooting your first scene. Austin has a very small part today. So we'll start without him If he gets late, that way we won't waste time," Director Pablo said.

" Yes Boss," Kayden replied which made Pablo laugh.

She had to shoot a scene today where she saw her ex-boyfriend with another girl at an after-party of an award show, but she would fake a smile for the cameras, and then she would meet Austin over there for the first time who was a huge fan of hers and won a competition to meet her. She would end up hiring him as her assistant because he was too funny and silly in his way and she craved some fun and attention in her depressing life where everybody just wanted to use her.

Director showed her around the set.

" Tell me when you're ready and I'll go behind the camera," he asked her.

"I'm ready," she said.

" Alright. The crew, everybody, stand in your places, we're shooting the first scene with Miss Kayden," he said, clapping at everybody.

Everybody started clapping after him. Kayden also joined in. This was like a celebratory congratulation for everybody on set for the amount of hard work that was going into the making of this film.

She took her place on the red carpet.

"And action," said the director.

She walked on the red carpet and came to stand in front of the camera, director rolled his camera slowly so that it recorded her with each step she took forward.

All the photographer side actors started flashing their lights on her, yelling at her to look right, look left, look straight.

Flashes went everywhere.

She was in a sky blue flowy dress which flowed from the back but was knee length at the front and she was wearing golden heels.

She portrayed a sad girl from her body posture. Like someone just barely holding up but her facial expression was confident and she gave a big smile.

But Tom, the actor who played her ex-boyfriend in the film, reached the after-party. His car stopped in front of the red carpet.

Director Pablo was shooting his entry now. Kayden didn't get out of her character because soon the camera was again going to fall on her.

She filled her body with the hurt that she needed to portray through her eyes.

It was just going to be a scene of ten seconds. She needed to show it all in that.

The ex-boyfriend got out of the car and walked the red carpet. The moment his eyes fell on her he gave her a coy smirk. The smirk of a heartbreaker. The guy who knew how he had her wrapped around his pinky. The guy who could get her back anytime he wanted and break her apart whenever he didn't need her.

When his eyes fell on her, the camera fell on her.

She looked at him.

First, she looked into his eyes with a look of recognition. This lasted for two seconds.

Then she let her eyes fall to the floor for a flicker of two seconds.

Then she looked up again at him and gave him a cold look, devoid of all the emotions in her eyes. Again for two seconds.

Then she turned her neck and looked straight at the cameras. For the first two seconds, she gave an impassive look to the photographers.

And in the next two seconds, she tilted her chin up, straightened her back, and smiled a mean, venomous look for the cameras and the camera that was by her side captured the ex-boyfriend looking at her as she did that. He looked regretful.

And like she had said, this scene was exactly ten seconds. Because after her full shot, the director yelled cut.