Lacey Jayne Interrogating Her Ass | [2021]

She stood up and walked barefoot to the kitchen—all marble and matte black fixtures, never used for cooking. On the counter sat a gift basket from a luxury wellness brand: CBD gummies, a rose quartz roller, a journal with MANIFEST embossed in gold. Lacey opened the journal. Page one was blank. She grabbed a pen from a drawer full of identical black pens (sponsored, of course).

Lacey Jayne set down the pen. She walked to the window and pressed her forehead against the cool glass. Down on the street, a couple emerged from a ramen shop, laughing, arms around each other’s waists. No camera crew. No stylist. No hashtag. Just two people, entirely unwatched, entirely alive.

Entertainment , she wrote next. Her show was entertainment. Her Instagram stories were entertainment. Even her “private” moments, the ones she sold to docuseries, were entertainment. But what did she find entertaining? She tried to remember the last movie she watched without analyzing the cinematography, the last song she heard without wondering about sync licensing. She couldn’t.

She wrote one more thing: If no one was watching, would I still do any of this?

Tomorrow: fire the social media manager. Cancel the podcast. Cancel the brand deal with the vodka that gives me migraines. Eat something ugly. Call Chloe and apologize properly.