Her Empire of Lies

Lia

“Just try to look like you belong here.” Serena’s voice is a whisper of honey and poison next to my ear. Her perfume, a custom blend I helped her design the marketing campaign for, clings to the air between us. “Smile. You look terrified.”

I force my lips into a shape that might pass for a smile. “I’m fine.”

“Are you? That dress is a choice.” She smoothes the front of her own gown, a column of glittering silver that probably costs more than my family’s car. We’re backstage at the Blackwood Academy Gala, the air thick with the smell of hairspray and money. On the other side of the curtain, hundreds of the country’s richest kids and their parents wait for the main event. For her.

“The theme was starlight,” I say, my voice flat. My navy blue dress feels like a cheap costume next to her supernova.

“Right. Well.” She gives me a pitying look. The same one she gave me when she told me my ideas were good, but my face wasn't ‘brand friendly’. The same look from the day I walked away from her, from the empire I built in the shadows for her. “I just want you to be comfortable. I know this isn't your world.”

My world was a sixteen inch monitor and editing software, turning her clumsy footage into viral gold. My world was a whiteboard covered in content pillars and engagement strategies. I handed her a career, and she talks to me like I’m a charity case.

My phone buzzes in my small clutch. I know without looking it’s my brother, Noah. His message will be something like ‘She’s about to go on! Is she nervous?’ He has no idea. He thinks Serena Vale is a self made goddess of inspiration. He has her poster on his wall.

“Noah sent me the most adorable message this morning,” she continues, her eyes scanning the crowd through a gap in the curtain. “He asked if I could give you a shout out on stage. Sweet, but obviously, no.”

My jaw tightens. “Don’t talk about my brother.”

“Why not? I love my fans.” She finally turns to look at me, her smile perfect, practiced, and utterly fake. A smile I storyboarded for her ‘relatable and real’ phase. “I’m his hero, Lia. You should be happy about that. It’s the closest he’ll ever get to this.”

She gestures vaguely at the shimmering ballroom, the clinking glasses, the soft murmur of generational wealth. Her words are a slap. She knows my scholarship status is a constant, heavy weight. She knows I stay at Blackwood for Noah, for the future it could give him.

“You’re on in five, Ms. Vale,” a stagehand says, his eyes lingering on her.

“Thank you,” she says, her voice instantly shifting, becoming warmer, more gracious. The mask slides perfectly into place. She turns back to me for one last word. “Remember what we talked about. No credit, no drama. You’re just a friend from school. Got it?”

“I remember the agreement I made,” I say through my teeth. The agreement to remain a ghost. The price of my freedom from her.

She pats my arm, a gesture that looks supportive to anyone watching but feels like a brand on my skin. “Good. Now go find a seat in the back. The lighting is more flattering there.”

She sweeps through the curtain to a roar of applause. I watch her on the monitors backstage, my creation taking her throne. She moves with a confidence I programmed, hitting the marks I taught her, her speech flowing with a cadence I wrote. It’s about authenticity, of course. It’s always about authenticity.

I slip out into the ballroom, the noise and light a physical assault. I find an empty chair against the far wall, just as she suggested. The room is a sea of adoring faces, all pointed at the stage, at her. Large screens on either side of the stage show the livestream, the chat scrolling at an impossible speed. Hearts and praise. She is a queen addressing her court.

My phone buzzes again. It is Noah. ‘She looks like an angel.’

I feel a familiar sickness in my stomach. I type back, ‘She does.’

“…and so, as we look to the future, it’s about lifting each other up,” Serena is saying, her voice thick with fake emotion. “It’s about telling the truth. Your truth.”

Behind her, a massive projector screen displays her logo. It’s supposed to transition into a highlight reel of her charity work. The video I stayed up all night editing last year.

The screen flickers.

It goes black for a second. The room murmurs. Serena glances behind her, a tiny crack in her perfect composure.

Then, a new image appears. It’s grainy, shaky. Security camera footage. A familiar stairwell from the west wing of the school. There are two figures.

My blood runs cold.

It’s me. A girl with my hair, my build, wearing my jacket. And there’s Serena. The video has no sound, but the action is brutally clear. My digital self grabs Serena’s arm. They argue. Then, my image shoves her. Hard.

Serena’s likeness tumbles backward, disappearing down the stairs in a flurry of limbs. The video loops. The shove. The fall. Again. And again.

A single, collective gasp sucks the air out of the ballroom. Phones are already up, recording the screen. On the livestream chat, the hearts vanish, replaced by question marks, then accusations. The text flies by, a torrent of hate.

‘OMG LIA SMITH??’ ‘THE SCHOLARSHIP GIRL DID THAT??’ ‘EXPEL HER. NOW.’ ‘#SerenaValeAssault’

On stage, Serena turns back to the audience. Her face, projected twenty feet high, is a perfect mask of shock and horror. A single tear traces a flawless path down her cheek. The crowd’s gasp turns into a roar of sympathy and anger. The cameras zoom in on her trembling lip.

I can’t breathe. My hands are numb. Every head in the room swivels, a hundred pairs of eyes finding me in my dark corner. They look at me with disgust, with hatred. I am a monster in a navy blue dress.

I am completely and utterly alone, frozen in the spotlight of a lie I never told, destroyed by the very tools I taught her how to use.