You Look Different in Real Life

had urged. “You don’t want to seem cruel, especially in the film. Her mom is still one of my best friends.”
    It had been close to a year since we’d hung out, withme preferring to spend my time with a couple of other friends. Normal friends , I remember thinking. When we went to that movie, some boring historical drama, she kept looking over at me and touching my arm, like she wanted to make sure I was still there. That it was real, having her friend back.
    During the two months that Lance and Leslie were in town with their cameras, Rory and I did all the things we used to. Which wasn’t much, but I know to her it seemed like an embarrassment of riches. We hung out at her house and did puzzles. We went for walks in the woods. I didn’t sit with her in the cafeteria, because I couldn’t risk losing my friends, but I’d meet her after school and we’d get snacks at the Stewart’s convenience store. Lance and Leslie filmed us doing all this.
    Another image fades in, as I stare at that lens again.
    Rory waiting for me outside our middle school, in her hands a fresh five-dollar bill earmarked for salt and vinegar potato chips and an iced tea at the convenience store. And then her face after I told her I couldn’t go anymore, that I had something else after school every single day from now on. Her face, not getting it, as she asked me when I was free. On the weekends, maybe? As soon as school ends for the year?
    I didn’t have to see her face when she called to invite me to that summer’s Renaissance Faire. This is when I finally told her we weren’t friends anymore and to stopcalling and stop talking to me, period.
    “You must have been relieved to find out,” Leslie is saying.
    “What?” I shake my head, coming back from Mars.
    “About Rory being on the autism spectrum.”
    “Oh.”
    I’d done some searching online. Things made sense. But it had been too late and in the end, it wouldn’t have mattered. Rory was Rory. I was me. I didn’t want to hang around her anymore and by then, I had Felix.
    Leslie taps Lance on the leg, who pulls away from the camera and says, “What? What do you want me to do?”
    “We need to stop. Or at least, take a break.”
    “You think ?” he snarls.
    “Don’t be an asshole about it.”
    “I’m sorry, Les. I’m just getting a little frustrated and tired.”
    “Tired of what?” I ask. Tired of me? I know what they must be thinking. This can’t be the same girl. The eleven-year-old who expertly mimicked famous movie lines and liked to answer Leslie’s questions as a made-up hippie character named Starlight Lovepeace.
    Leslie rubs one of her eyes wearily. “This is the third interview we’ve done where we’re not feeling . . . we’re not getting the kind of material we’d like. It was the same with Nate and Keira.”
    Something about the way she says this enrages me.
    “Maybe you should just write us a script,” I say, “and we’ll follow it.”
    Leslie looks quickly at me, then at Lance, and Lance takes the camera off pause.
    “That’s not what I meant, Justine.” Leslie smoothly steps out of the way and into the corner of my room.
    “What kind of material do you want? What are you not getting?”
    “We wish you guys would open up more. It’s like we keep hitting these dead ends with everyone. There’s so much you don’t want to talk about.”
    “Uh, yeah. Because we’re teenagers .” And as soon as I say this, I know I’ve given them another great sound bite. Dammit.
    “I guess we were just expecting to have . . . more to shoot,” says Leslie. “With you.”
    “Our producers at Independent Eye really wanted you to be positioned as the focus,” adds Lance.
    “The focus? What, like, the star ?”
    Leslie shrugs. “You’ve always been the most popular one.”
    I know this is true. I know Felix would be jealous to hear this. Nate too, probably.
    “I’m sorry. I’m sorry I don’t have a story this time around.” It comes out sounding pissy and I like that.
    Lance turns off the camera now and replaces the lens cap, so I know it’s not coming back on. The room expandsto normal size. I can breathe. But there’s this overwhelming feeling of having let someone down. Who? Them? Myself? I feel a tickle in my nose like I might cry, but no no no, none of that, young lady. That is so not an option right now.
    Leslie has been examining me, carefully, with concern. I get the feeling this might be who she really is, when she’s not