I don’t know if I’ve been this exhausted in a long time.

Pulling my robe around me, I push the sheets on my bed down and slip under the covers. I feel freshly cried out - not just physically exhausted, but also mentally and emotionally tired.

I’m just so damn tired.

And it isn’t from keeping up the charade of pretending I’m in love with Jason. It was from keeping up the charade that I was only pretending to be in love with him.

I reach over to the nightstand and click the light off, bathing the room in complete darkness except for a small sliver of light sneaking between the curtains on the window. I don’t know if the light is coming from the boardwalk or the moon, though.

I think the party might still be going on down in the lobby. The after-party for the gala is always a rager.

Some of the girls will drink too much and then have to pull it all together for the pageant. They have enough hours to sleep it off, though, I guess.

I don’t know if there are enough hours from now until tomorrow for me to sleep off the humiliation I just experienced.

Not that it matters. I received a text from Jason about Cynthia. It doesn’t matter how she found out, and I don’t really care. Tomorrow morning, when the story about my and Jason’s engagement being fake hits the papers, I’m going to have to drop out of the pageant, anyway.

I’ve already decided not to implicate the organizers or anyone else involved. I’ve decided that, if I want to try to salvage my reputation, I will have to take full responsibility and not appear to be shifting blame to anyone else. I mean, I did agree to this, didn’t I?

I did agree to it, even though my gut told me not to do it at first.

This is all my fault. I should never have agreed to it.

And Jason just got wrapped up in it. He never asked for this.

But when I think of him, it’s really hard to feel bad for him. I don’t know what to think about him right now. I don’t know what to feel about him.

He said they were arguing about the engagement, and I believe him. But he hid the fact that he knew her. I know it shouldn’t be a big deal, and I think if I’d learned about it differently, it wouldn’t be...or maybe I’m just trying to soften the blow to my ego.

Maybe I am just now realizing that Jason’s reputation and mine aren’t so different after all.

Maybe neither of us has been completely honest.

And I’m just really, really fucking exhausted.

So I shut my eyes tight, and I expect tears, but they just don’t come. I don’t know why, and I almost want them to come, but they don’t.

This has always been the most nerve-wracking night of pageant week: the night before the big contest. But tonight, I don’t even care.

Tonight, I’m not nervous.

Tonight, I feel nothing.

* * *

I wake up after a fast sleep. You know when you sleep and it feels like you’re fully aware of all the hours that passed because you can’t believe they’ve passed so quickly? When I wake up, I feel like I never went to bed, but like I’ve slept for ten years at the same time.

I feel clarity, and calm, and confidence. Things I haven’t felt in a long time.

Because today, I don’t know what’s going to happen to me. Everything is out of my hands.

And strangely, it’s kind of refreshing.

When I wake up, the room is filled with light. I must have opened the curtains in the middle of the night, though I don’t remember it. The sky is big and bright blue, and I smile softly as I roll over to look at my phone.

I’m not sure what to expect, but I know it can’t be good. What I find, though, I’m surprised and happy about.

There’s a story about me having a meltdown at the gala last night, but there is nothing about me and Jason faking our engagement. It seems that Cynthia found a better story - one of a beauty queen actually being human and having an argument with her fiancé - and ran with that, instead. I feel a little pull inside my belly, something that tempers my relief slightly.

Because there’s something else in me. I feel like a fraud.

After everything, I feel like a damn fraud.

Because the comments on the story are talking about how I’m just a normal girl and a sweet person and how relatable I am.

But I’m not. I really am a fake.

I swallow hard. I already know what I have to do. I figured it out sometime last night when I was sleeping.

That clarity, that calm I feel? It’s because I know what I have to do.

I have to drop out of the pageant.

Sitting up in bed, I dial Mrs. Pathmoore.

“I hope you’re ready for a wonderful competition today!” she chirps into the phone. “Cassandra, have you seen the paper? Everyone loves you. You’ve never been hotter!”

“I saw,” I sigh, running my hand through my hair and resting my elbows on my knees, “but I don’t know if I can go through with this.”

“Through with what, dear?” Mrs. Pathmoore asks.

This is what she does. This is what we all do. Play dumb, just ask questions, don’t admit that you know anything. Don’t let on that you know more than you seem to.

I know Mrs. Pathmoore is only feigning bewilderment right now.

“Through with the pageant,” I say, pinching the bridge of my nose and closing my eyes, “I think I have to drop out.”

There is silence on the other end of the phone for a moment.

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Mrs. Pathmoore chuckles, “you’ve never had a better chance at winning the crown than you do right now!”

“No,” I say, “I can’t do it. I’ve lied to enough people. I can’t go through with it.”

“I’m afraid you are required to go through with it, dear,” Mrs. Pathmoore replies.

I feel as though the air has been sucked out of me, like the oxygen in the room has disappeared.

“What do you mean?” I ask, hedging, pressing, bluffing. “How can I be required to do anything?”

“Dear, it is part of your contract with the pageant,” she says gently, “barring an extreme circumstance, you must compete unless the forfeiture of your position has been approved by the organizers.”

“Okay,” I say, jumping out of bed, “then tell them that I want to forfeit my position.”

“I’m afraid it has already been discussed,” she says, “and the organizers have decided that the best thing for everyone would be for you to compete.”

I feel my breathing become shallow, and my blood heat up.

“This is...this is highly unacceptable!” I shout into my phone. I want to tell her it’s fucking bullshit, but I’m not used to talking like that to her.

“I know you are upset, Cassandra,” she says consolingly, “but if you just press forward with this, it will all be over by the end of tonight.”

“I won’t do it,” I say, beginning to pace the room, “you can’t force me to do anything. I just won’t show up.”

“I’m sorry to throw a technicality at you,” she sighs, “but if you read the original contract you signed, you will see that the pageant reserves the right to seek damages should you drop out without their approval.”

She’s right. I was bluffing. I know what I signed. This is a kind, sweet way for her to tell me that they’ll sue my ass off for the expenses they laid out for me, plus unspecified damages associated with advertising something - me, as though I’m a freaking handbag on TV shopping channel - that they can’t deliver.

But she doesn’t know that Cynthia is aware of the contract. Surely, if she knew this still had the potential to get out, they would allow me to remove myself from the contest.

“There is an extreme circumstance that I should bring to your attention,” I say calmly, “a reporter knows that Jason and I aren’t really together.”

This might be the leverage I need to get the hell out of this thing. Cut ties once and for all. I didn’t want it to come to this, but I just want to get the hell out.

“I don’t have to remind you that the contract you and Mr. Anderson signed is between you and him solely, and that it does not implicate the pageant in any way.”

Shit. I pull the phone away from my ear and pull up my email to look at the digit copy I emailed myself. I scan it quickly, looking for any mention of the pageant.

And she’s right. There’s nothing tying the pageant to my and Jason’s agreement, and if I should go public with this information and throw the pageant under the bus, I know there is no way in hell I will ever compete again.

“I can’t believe it,” I say.

“I’m sorry,” Mrs. Pathmoore says. “I really am. I’ve thought of every contingency and I’ve run it past the organizers. They have both of us by - excuse my language - the balls, Cassie.”

“Fine,” I say through gritted teeth, “I’ll be there. But there’s one thing I need you to do for me.”

“What is it, dear?” she asks softly.

I take a deep breath and consider what I’m about to do. I don’t know if it’s the right thing, but I know that I can’t go through with the alternative.

“Can you please tell Jason that he is relieved of his contract, effective immediately?”

There is a silence on the other end of the phone before Mrs. Pathmoore replies.

“I think I can have a discussion with the organizers to facilitate that change to your contract,” she replies gently. “But are you sure that’s what you want, Cassandra?”

Of course I don’t know if it’s what I want. I don’t know what I want.

All I know is that I can’t see Jason right now.

“Yes,” I reply. “Please see what you can do.”

“I will. And Cassandra, remember what I told you. This will all be over soon.”

I end the call and flop down on my bed.

She’s right. It will be over soon enough.

And then, like she told me yesterday, I can go back to my normal life.

Without Jason.