In the comments, I caught a glimpse of, “I knew it,” and dozens of people calling me a slut. One even said I was probably sleeping with every guy in the band. Another said we’d only been rescued by Dan because I was screwing him, too. My eyes watered with tears, and I barely managed to blink them back. How could people be so cruel? And what was with these double standards—Jared could sleep with dozens of women and no one batted an eyelash, yet one photo of me hugging a guy and I was a slut? I hated the Internet.

Jared clicked away to a different screen with a sigh. “I told you not to read them.”

I knew I shouldn’t take the attacks personally, but it was hard. I wanted to ignore the slut comments, but the underlying sentiment behind every word was that I didn’t deserve to be in the band or on the show. That I was a talentless hack, I’d gotten in the band by accident, and I was bringing the rest of the guys down with me. And it killed me because, deep down, I suspected all of that was true.

“I have to go,” I mumbled, stumbling to the door.

Jared opened his mouth like he wanted to say something but then shook his head and dropped his eyes. I fled their room and ran down the stairs to my floor. No elevator this time. I couldn’t risk running into anyone from the show right now. I had to get away—from the guys, from the show, from this life.

An hour later, someone knocked on my door. Jared stood outside, hands shoved in his pockets. He didn’t move to kiss me, and any hope that things would be the same between us quickly slipped away.

“Not okay?” he asked softly.

“Not really.” I stepped back to let him in, and he checked the hallway to make sure it was empty before he entered. He stood just inside the door—close but not close enough—and every inch of my body strained to throw myself into his arms. I needed him to kiss me and tell me everything would be okay, but he didn’t make a move.

“We talked to Dan. He said the photo was no big deal and that we shouldn’t worry about it.”

“No big deal? Has he seen what people are saying about us?”

“He says this kind of shit always happens and it will blow over soon. He doesn’t think it will hurt our chances on the show.”

“I hope he’s right.”

“Me too…but maybe we should cool it for a while. Stop seeing each other, at least until the show is over. We don’t need any more bad publicity.”