You’re only allowed to hide out in your house for so long before you have to at least open the garage door and drive your black Range Rover with tinted windows out onto the streets of Beverly Hills. Of course, once you accomplish that, it’s a mad dash by all the paparazzi to chase after you in hopes of getting that elusive picture because for the last month you’ve stayed in your house with your blinds closed.

That’s me in a nutshell. For the most part, I felt like I was on house arrest, but the truth is I couldn’t face the public. Not that thirty days behind closed doors is going to make a difference in the matter, not when Van has been seen out and about with his rumored girlfriend according to TMZ. When I see segments like that, it makes everything ten times worse. I don’t know why I expected him to wait until the ink was dry on our divorce papers since he had been cheating on me. Clearly, that was a sign that he had moved on from our relationship. I guess I thought he’d offer me that courtesy. I was wrong.

Our divorce is moving along swimmingly or as smoothly as humanly possible. Ryan, my agent, kept good on his promise to send the best divorce lawyer he knew. To say that Brenda Guinn is a shark would be an understatement. I swear she eats men for breakfast. After our initial meeting, she had papers drawn up and served to Van the next day. He called, and I ignored him. There wasn’t anything that he could say that would change my mind.

The only problem that remained was the band. After a long conversation with Darian, Rusty, and Gabe, we decided that Van would stay in the band to finish out the album. I’d play nice as long as Van kept his space. We’d finish out the tour, complete our obligatory commitments and go from there. The guys weren’t exactly thrilled with the idea of replacing Van, and honestly neither am I, but I don’t know if I can work with him.

Which leads me to where I am now, behind the wheel of my car and backing out of my driveway, not paying attention to who is in my way. I figure if I hit them, they deserve it for not moving out of the way.

Today, we’re filming the music video for our recent release. I’m not over the moon excited about having to spend the day with Van, but the guys have promised they’ll run interference. Of course, I have a tremendous amount of anxiety right now, and driving is probably the last thing I should be doing. The idea of seeing Van… it does things to me. While my heart aches from missing him and breaks from the damage he’s done, my brain is telling me that he’s a piece of shit and that I need to kick him hard where his family jewels are. That’s what I should’ve done when I caught him in the act instead of standing there and watching. It took forever for me to process what I was seeing and by the time I did he was scowling at me.

The thought of seeing him today has me torn. I can’t shut the love I feel for him off like a light switch even though that is what he’s done. I mean, you don’t cheat on the ones you love so clearly he’s no longer in love with me, but failed to give me the memo, despite what his numerous voicemails say.

I’m followed steadily by the paparazzi who were able to hop in their cars and not lose me in traffic. Fortunately for me, they can’t see through my tinted windows. Unfortunately, though, a few have decided to get in front of me so they can get a picture of me driving. You know, because that will sell so well. I don’t even want to know what sort of bogus headline they’ll come up with to try and sell copies. For the most part, each time Van and I have been in the media it’s been for what I’d consider fun stuff. Pictures of us shopping, looking at puppies or on vacation would appear, but never anything that led to a controversy. Now we’re front and center, and our lives are being played out in the media like a real-life soap opera.

With my current dilemma, the only saving grace is that our video shoot is being done in a production lot, which means security. I sigh heavily as I signal to turn in knowing full well the cars in front and behind me can’t follow me in.

“Good morning,” the security guard says.

“Hi. I’m Zara Phillips,” I tell him, handing him my driver's license. “We’re shooting on stage twelve today.”

He does his due diligence and checks his clipboard, using my ID as a ruler as he goes down the list of names that are allowed through the gates without proper identification.

“Thank you, Mrs. Philips,” he says with a smile as he hands my license back to me. I open my mouth to correct him, but the words fail on the tip of my tongue. My eyes begin to water behind my dark glasses as I offer him a strained smile.

Once the cross bar is lifted, I pull through and follow the directions I was given to the sound stage. I’ve opted to leave my window down for a little bit of fresh air knowing full well that no one on this production lot gives a rats ass about me and what I’m going through.

As soon as I put my car in park, Darian is at the driver’s side door and opening it. “You’re late,” he says. “Caleb didn’t think you were going to show.”

“I’m here, and maybe if the label had sent a car, I wouldn’t have had to drive and be mindful of the paparazzi that have been camping outside my house for a month.” My tone is snippy and not meant to piss Darian off, but I can see that I have. “Look, I’m sorry. I don’t mean to snap at you; I’m just angry at this whole situation.”

“I know. C’mon.” Darian puts his arm around me and leads me to the sound stage door where Caleb Gilbert is standing and taking up most of the space with his hulking frame. Caleb is an executive from the record label who tells us what to do and when. His job is to make sure the label doesn’t suffer, and I have a feeling he’s none too happy with Van and me right now.

“Zara, it’s nice of you to show up.”

Mentally I’m flipping him off. Physically, I’m smiling as brightly as possible while my eyes are throwing daggers into his.

“Traffic was a bitch,” I tell him. I feel Darian tap me on my back. It’s his subtle way of telling me to be nice. I cock my eyebrow at Caleb and motion toward the inside of the studio. Obviously, if I’m late, you’d think he would want to get started.

When he finally does move, it isn’t without great effort and a dramatic sigh. His antics aren’t lost on me. He’s a diva. I’m a diva. It’s what makes us money. He’s also a huge fan of Van’s and probably feels like I’m over reacting.

As soon as Darian and I step in, there are gasps and murmurs from the galley of extra’s that will be in the video. Funnily enough, the song is very West Side Story with a girl falling for a guy from the wrong side of the tracks. The dancers are supposed to tell the story through their interpretation while Reverend Sister sings in the background. I tried to get the label to agree that we didn’t need to be on set for this to happen, that the dancers could perform to a recorded version, but they wanted live. Every production nowadays has to be live, and that can be exhausting for an artist.

The personal assistant on set intersects with us and pushes Darian and me toward the dressing room. The closer I get, the more stalled my steps become. Knowing Van is behind that door really does a number on my psyche and I’m not sure I can handle seeing him.

“It’s okay,” Darian whispers in my ear. “He’s not in there.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah. I asked Caleb to make sure you had your space before the shoot started. He’s here though, Zara, and he looks like shit.”

We stop right before the door marked “dressing room” and I turn to face Darian. Slowly I lift my sunglasses so he can see that I too look like shit. This past month hasn’t been all sunshine and rainbows for me.

Darian sighs and nods toward the door. “Let’s go get ready.”

I’m sure in the back of his mind he thinks that I’ll need extra time in the chair to eliminate the dark bags and puffy eyes. He’s right to think that. As much as I wish I could say my nights have been filled with sleep and I haven’t cried since the day I caught Van, I’d be lying.

I’m trying to remain strong, but it’s hard. Van is the only man I have ever been with. He was my first kiss, my first love… I gave him everything and only asked that he love me in return. Lately, I’ve been wondering what the triggers were or what they might have been. We didn’t fight, rarely argued over anything that would cause either of us to seek solace in another person and genuinely loved spending our time together or at least I thought we did, but clearly I was mistaken.

The make-up artist and hair stylist get to work once I sit down. Oddly enough I find this very relaxing. Neither of them says anything about my disarrayed look. Probably fearing they’d get fired if they were to open their mouths and ask what the hell have I been not doing to myself. These women are professionals though and can handle anything that sits in their chair.

Some rank smelling cream is put on my face, right under my eyes. The scent cleans out my nasal passage rather quickly. I don’t even have to ask her what it is. I’ve been a victim of bags under my eyes before and already know she’s put hemorrhoid cream on me to curb the swelling. I tell myself to suck it up. I knew this shoot was going to happen and I could’ve prepared better.

I’m poked, prodded and painted to look somewhat human and more like the Zara Phillips that everyone knows. The one that showed up today is not how I usually leave the house and know I need to make a conscious effort to be better about that. I can’t let Van have this much control over me.

Looking at myself in the mirror, the girls stand beside me, marveling in the job they’ve done. In a matter of seconds, they turned me back into the person that I’m used to being. They brought life to face and hair with a few strokes of their personal magic.

“Beautiful as always.”

I freeze at the sound of Van’s voice and slowly turn my head to find him standing in the doorway, looking as sexy as ever in his leather pants, combat boots, and ripped t-shirt that probably cost a few hundred dollars.

The young girl who fell in love with him wants to run to him and collapse in his arms, but the woman he scorned has a stronger voice. Van takes two steps into the dressing room, and I shake my head while taking steps toward him. We’re almost torso-to-torso with him looking down to me.

“You don’t get to say that to me,” I say through a clenched jaw.

“You’re still my wife.” He casually points out.

“The day you stuck your dick into someone else is the day you stopped being my husband.” I side-step him and rush out the door, not watching where I’m walking and run smack into a man and his hot cup of coffee. “Ow, mother fu…” I let my f-bomb trail off as I jam the part of my burnt hand into my mouth. Tears begin to form, but I refuse to cry knowing that Van is right behind me.

“Z are you okay?” he asks, pulling on my hand while the man in front of me looks on with larger than life eyes at the scene that is playing out in front of him. If I had to wager a guess, I’d say he’s an extra for the shoot, but he’s dressed wrong in his trucker hat, plaid shirt, tight jeans and from the looks of it, cowboy boots.

“Don’t touch me,” I mumble and step away from him.

“Are you all right, ma’am?” the man who burnt my hand says in the nicest southern drawl I have ever heard. Not that I’ve heard many, but a few.

“I am… sort of.” My hand is burnt, and for some dumb reason, I show him where. He softly takes my hand over to the craft services tables and puts together a napkin with some ice.

“I am very sorry. I should’ve been watchin' where I was walking,” he tells me as he holds my hand gently in his.

I am completely dumbfounded by this man, and for the life of me, I can’t put my finger on as to why.

“It’s okay. I should’ve signaled before I left the room.” My joke is corny, and I don’t expect him to laugh, but he does, and soon I find myself laughing right along with him until someone steps next to me and takes my injured hand out of his and applies cream and a bandage. Before I can thank him, he’s disappeared, but Van is there to continue to ruin my day.