time for change,

[Christopher 'Dustin' Harris]

DUSTIN HARRIS,

- - - - -

I'VE GOTTA SAY RESPECTFULLY I WOULD LIKE IT IF YOU TAKE
THE CAMERAS OFF OF ME CAUSE I JUST WANT A LITTLE ROOM
to breathe can you please respect my privacy
- - - - -

"And remember, don't talk to anyone who has a camera. I know we said that no one knows you're here but you know the press. No doubt they have sources. And if anyone has a notepad out, don't say anything!" Dustin Harris rolled his eyes as his publicist rambled on, her voice slightly crackled due to the poor reception from wherever she was. "And if anyone tries to abuse you-" "Rach, relax. I'll be fine. I'm a big boy. I can handle the haters. Quit freaking. I'll talk to you later" He cut Rachel off, hitting the 'end' button on his iPhone and slipped it into his Raw Denim jeans back pocket, shaking his head. As much as he loved his publicist Rachel Evans, she could be incredibly panicky sometimes. She was good at her job though which was all that mattered. So good in fact that she'd been Dustin's publicist since he was about seven years old when he'd first entered show business. Given that he was twenty years old now, that was ten long years! When Dustin was little he'd always relied very heavily on whatever Rachel told him, along with his manager Bob but now as he was getting older, he was starting to feel a little suffocated. Rachel was always fussing over his whereabouts and reminding him over and over again on what to say whenever he was around the public. You'd think he was new to the business by the way she rambled on.

Right now though, Rachel had every reason to be freaking out over Dustin's current situation. Every publicist’s worst nightmare is their client having a scandal. The press goes insane and you have to be extremely careful with where you go, who you are seen with and what you say. One wrong move could completely destroy your career, not that Dustin needed to worry about that since his career was basically already destroyed enough as it was now. He'd already been pulled from the new movie he was supposed to start filming in two weeks and had a bunch of talk-shows cancel their interviews with him. It didn't get much worse than that for Dustin but there was always a few more metres to fall. That was the price you had to pay for hitting your girlfriend when you were famous. It didn't help that Dustin's now ex-girlfriend was famous too, meaning that the news spread even quicker. The whole big scandal had only happened about a week ago but Dustin was still struggling to get his head around how bad everything was. He barely even remembered that infamous night since he'd been still a fair bit drunk at the time. All he seemed to recall right now was Jenna screaming at him, stupid Langford's smug face as he pushed past Dustin at the bedroom door, and then standing across the room from Jenna, yelling and screaming back and forth. Not the most pleasant memories.

Unfortunately Jenna had not been as drunk as Dustin on the night although she'd had a few glasses of champagne but her word was certainly more valid than Dustin's right now. No matter though, Dustin was sure he'd get through it. Right now he had other issues and while they weren't as worrisome as getting sent to jail for abusing your girlfriend, he was still quite nervous. As he strode up the steps of the Valkyrie University's Administration building, he glanced around him. Sure, he had told Rachel he was fine but he still wasn't used to walking around in public, so exposed with no publicist or bodyguards surrounding him. He was an open target. Dustin jumped up the last few steps and pulled the main doors open. As he walked in, he took a deep breath, a smirk on his lips. Ha, he'd done it. He was actually going to a proper college. For the past few years he'd been homeschooled and tutored etc. He hadn't actually been to a proper school in years. Finally he was getting the opportunity to go to a proper unviversity with real people who weren't all stuck up and superficial like the rest of Hollywood. Then again he was one of those stuck up superficial people. But anyway, he was kind of looking forward to a new adventure.

Approaching the front desk, Dustin put on his most charming smile and aimed it at the lady sitting down in front of a sign that read 'Receptionist'. "Gooood afternoon." he commented, leaning against the desk casually. The lady barely even glanced up at him as she typed away on the keyboard in front of her, her eyes glued to her computer screen. "Ahem.." Dustin cleared his throat impatiently. The lady finally glanced up and immediately smiled back. "Oh, yes. Good afternoon!" she exclaimed, looking slightly flustered. A second later, the phone rang. "Oh excuse me, I'll be one moment. Just take a seat!" The lady, who's nametag read 'Gina', waved a hand in the direction of the red plush seats as she picked up the phone. Dustin was not used to being told to wait but he took a seat all the same and looked around the empty administration area boredly. He wasn't exactly sure what he was supposed to be doing in here but apparently he needed to check in and get a timetable or something. Whatever, he had nothing better to do right now.

- - - - -

STATUS; finished !
WORD COUNT; 904
TAGGED TO; open !
TIME/PLACE; 31st of august, around three o'clock / administration office, valkyrie university,
CREDITS; format inspired by lainey and other v-siders. lyrics from 'rumors' by lindsay lohan
OUTFIT; heree
NOTES; kinda lame ending but it's my first dustin thread so make it fun!

- - - - -

[Anabel Bailey]

THE GROCERY STORE WAS
way too loud for Anabel Bailey's taste as she tried to pick between the variety of prenatal vitamins, wishing Jason was there. He knew more about this stuff than she did, or at least she would guess so. Wasn't that what they taught in all those science classes? The blond looked up with wide eyes when an elegant woman, probably one of the wealthier in Valkyrie reached for one of the brands Ana had been eying. Her eyes glanced down at the other woman's protruding belly and she swore she felt a pang in her chest. She wanted to look like that... when she was twenty-five, not now. Brushing her fingers through her hair she followed the woman's lead, placing the vitamins in the basket over her arm with the wheat bread, bananas, and, of all things, pink frosted doughnuts. Doughnuts were not among Ana's favorite foods, they had nothing on her mom's churros in her mind, but she was fairly certain this was the beginning of her cravings. Why, otherwise, would she be wanting doughnuts with sprinkles and pink frosting? It was altogether irritating, and everyone swore the cravings would only get worse and weirder.

JOINING LINE SIX, ANA
fidgetted a bit. All of her classes were before two, but the last had been cancelled because the professor's mom had fallen and broken her hip. Annie was glad her mother was still rather young, just over forty, so she didn't need to worry much about her for a while. Taking her mind off the thought of something happening to her mother, the petite woman glanced toward the magazines on the rack beside her. Scanning the covers, she smirked as she read the Enquirer and National Examiner headlines, her favorite reading Jennifer Aniston has her heart broken by Joe Biden. She couldn't imagine being a celebrity, always being followed by papparazzi and lied about. It was no way to live, as far as she was concerned. That certainly didn't keep Annie from reaching for a copy of People magazine, though. She loved celebrity gossip, regardless of its veracity, though People was fairly accurate most of the time. It was a nice break from her usual Cosmo, which she had a subscription to. Besides, the way she felt now with the morning sickness that lasted well past the morning she doubted sex was going to sound like fun for a while.

SHUFFLING FORWARD WITH
the rest of the line, she set her basket on the conveyor belt, scanning the cover of the magazine in her hands. Her pretty face crumpled into a frown as she stared with disgust at the poor woman on the cover with an unsightly bruise and the picture of her now ex-boyfriend stalking away from a camera. Annie had been in her share of abusive relationships and she just plain had no sympathy for a man that would raise his fist against a woman. She had always been a tough girl so it had never been a problem for her, she could fight back if she had to, but she knew there were some women that couldn't. Setting the magazine in the basket with her other purchases she stepped up and began fishing through her green purse for her grape colored wallet, her head nodding emphatically when the cashier mentioned the headline news on the cover of the magazine she was purchasing, calling Dustin Harris disgusting. "Oh, I know, right," Annie said with a shake of her head, fishing out a twenty to pay for her things. Taking her change, she took the plastic bags and headed out of the grocery store.

WALKING OUT TO HER CAR,
Ana hit the button on her key fob to unlock the sleek silver sports car in the parking lot. Jason still had another class for the day so after she got her schedule changed for next semester in the registration offices she was going to pick him up so they could go home. Really, Ana just liked driving the Mercedes, hence her reasoning for going grocery shopping on her own in the middle of the day. Placing her food on the leather seat beside her, Annie pulled out of her parking space and took the roads back to the university a tad fast, though it was hard not to, behind the wheel of a purring six cylinder. It didn't take her long to arrive on campus once more and parking outside the attractive stucco building, Annie shouldered her purse, grabbed her magazine, and headed inside, her fiancé's car locking behind her with a honk.

THE BLAST OF COLD AIR AS
she entered the offices was welcome from the ninety degree weather she was coming from. Striding up to the front desk with a definite air of poise, the petite blond stood for a moment, waiting to be acknowledged before she spoke up, "Excuse me, I need to get my schedule--" her eyes widened and she quieted as the woman behind the desk directed her to one of the red seats in the corner. Pursing her lips, Annie did as told. She'd been raised in the south before moving to California as a teenager and it always amazed her how rude some people were. Sitting down cadicorner to a man who looked about her age, Ana crossed her legs, not paying him a ton of mind, merely flashing a smile his way. Running her fingers through her hair casually, she flipped through her magazine until she found the cover story. Of course, Annie wasn't a quiet type, not even with strangers, and it didn't take her long to bring up what she was reading to the man beside her, as usual sticking her foot in her mouth because she hadn't really looked at him. "You know, this whole abuse deal, totally ruins that movie for me. What was it called? The one with Dustin Harris and Jenna Brownings. I loved that movie." She shook her head a bit, staring at the zoomed in picture of a bruise on the attractive young actress. She could still remember the night she'd seen the movie with Jason and she'd loved it, though of course she was a real sap for a happy ending, sealed with a kiss, and the fact that the stars of the movie were dating had made it even better, though now it was just sort of ruined for her.

WORD COUNT: 1074
OUTFIT: here
NOTES: wooow, so lame ending. yikes. but oh well, figured i'd give you something to work with.

[/center]

[Christopher 'Dustin' Harris]

DUSTIN HARRIS,

- - - - -

I'VE GOTTA SAY RESPECTFULLY I WOULD LIKE IT IF YOU TAKE
THE CAMERAS OFF OF ME CAUSE I JUST WANT A LITTLE ROOM
to breathe can you please respect my privacy
- - - - -

Tapping his feet to an imaginary beat, Dustin let out a long sigh. He was probably one of the most impatient people in the world and this was really testing his patience. He glanced at his watch for the tenth time and frowned. Seriously, it was like the time was going extra slow just to torture him. Then again sitting here being anonymous made a nice change to walking out on the streets and being worried of being recognised. There had been a time not too long ago when being recognised was pretty awesome. Dustin quite enjoyed getting swamped by cute fangirls asking for his photo and autograph. That still happened occasionally but thanks to the whole drama with Jenna, now whenever he was recognised on the streets, this meant getting jeered at and hit by old ladies' handbags. He also got disgusted looks from strangers now and shoved while he was just walking along by himself all innocently. Then again he wasn't exactly able to do anything innocently anymore apparently. His innocent reputation as the current heart throb was completely gone and he was sure that thousands of girls had taken their cheap magazine posters of him off their walls. Now he was just the stupid up-himself celebrity that hit his girlfriend who no one wanted to be associated with. All because of one night that went all wrong.

Stupid stupid Dustin.

And stupid stupid Jenna for thinking that she could get away with cheating on him. No one seemed to be concerned about the reason that Dustin hit her. Hello, she had basically committed adultery and everyone seemed fine with it but ooh because Dustin drunkenly laid his hands on her, it was this big scandal. That was so messed up. Dustin had been reading a couple of gossip sites, even though he knew nothing good would come out of it, and hardly any of them had mentioned Jenna and Trent's crime. By the sounds of that creepy Perez Hilton gossip freak site Dustin had just hit Jenna because he was drunk and in a bad mood. Not true. He'd been in a great mood until he'd walked into the bedroom to see Jenna not alone. Dustin had tried telling a few paparazzi reporters that but they were more interested in asking him how he felt being known as the jerk who beats women. Stupid questions. He'd only ever hit one women - not counting his little arguments with his sister - so that reputation was extremely unnecessary. Dustin was kind of starting to hate paparazzi now. Once upon a time he'd loved the attention and sure he still did but now the attention was turning more negative and where he used to get wolf whistles and people calling out for him to smile 'over here! over here!', now it was angry shouts and calls to go and hide his face because he was a disgrace and should be ashamed of himself. Did people actually think that he didn't feel bad about this? Hell, he'd spent the first few days after the scandal holed up in his room feeling awful and calling Jenna over and over again, leaving countless messages on her voicemail. It was all hopeless though because Jenna wanted nothing to do with him anymore.

As Dustin contiuned to tap his foot impatiently, he unknowingly began to slap his thighs to the same beat and it wasn't long before the receptionist glared over at him and shushed him rudely. Well clearly she had no idea who he was or she wouldn't have been so rude. Or maybe she did and she was a big gossip fan. Either way, Dustin stopped his tapping and slapping and slumped back in his seat silently. This was ridiculous. Dustin finally stood up and swaggered over to the receptionist. "Excuse me, I'm here to-" As he spoke, the receptionist who was still on the phone looked up and glared at him. "One moment." she said firmly, waving a hand to indicate for him to sit down again. "Ughh." Dustin sighed as he spun around on his heel and went to sit back down again. Clearly the lady had no idea who he was or she'd get off the bloody phone and give him his uni schedule and junk and let him get out of here.

A few long and extremely boring moments later, Dustin felt a rush of warm air hit his face and looked up as someone else entered the room in the form of quite a pretty young girl with blonde hair. He glanced up boredly as the girl approached the receptionist. Ah, this would be interesting. Dustin half hoped the receptionist would be nice to her just so he could accuse her of being sexist but if she was rude to the girl that would just prove that the lady was a bit of a bitch. And five, four, three, two...she was a bitch. Dustin smiled smugly to himself as the girl turned around and took a seat near him without even noticing him. As she picked up a magazine and began to read it, Dustin went back to being bored and stared at the wallpaper, making out patterns on it, grateful that the girl hadn't seemed to recognise him yet and thus wasn't abusing him or jumping all over him. Girls could be scary sometimes. As Dustin thought about this, the blonde girl spoke up randomly, her eyes still on the magazine that looked a bit like People or some other celebrity goss mag. God, there was probably a ten page special on him and Jenna. Sure enough, the girl seemed to be on that page now. "You know, this whole abuse deal, totally ruins that movie for me. What was it called? The one with Dustin Harris and Jenna Brownings. I loved that movie." Dustin nodded silently, unsure of whether he wanted to bring attention to the fact that she was talking about him right now but if he didn't say something she'd look at him anyway so it was a lose-lose situation. Choosing to speak, Dustin leaned back and ran a hand through his hair. "The Beautiful Souls." he said shortly. "And yeah, it kind of ruined it for me too." he said with an ironic smile as he tipped his head back and sighed. He'd had so much fun with that movie. Heck, he'd fallen in love in that movie both on screen and off screen but that was all ruined now and now he had to discuss it all over again. So much for coming to Valkyrie to avoid all of this.

- - - - -

STATUS; finished !
WORD COUNT; 1,109
TAGGED TO; anabel !
TIME/PLACE; 31st of august, around three o'clock / administration office, valkyrie university,
CREDITS; format inspired by lainey and other v-siders. lyrics from 'rumors' by lindsay lohan
OUTFIT; heree
NOTES; hehe this should be fun xD

- - - - -

[Anabel Bailey]

A SIGH LEFT HER LIPS AS SHE
gazed at the picture of the lovely young star with an obvious bruise on her un-made-up face. She lifted a hand from her lap, gently touching her cheek, distinctly remembering the sharp, stinging pain of a fist from an ex-boyfriend. It was among the worst pain she'd ever known because along with the sting of her skin was the harsh knowledge that one was rejected, that one really wasn't cared for in the way they should be. Annie was lucky that she'd found someone to spend the rest of her life with who would never think to lay a hand on her; she couldn't imagine if she was in love with a violent man. There was just no excuse for it, none. Flipping the page, she gazed at a still from the movie they'd been in, her head shaking slowly. It was just so sad!

HER MIND WANDERED BACK
to the first time she'd seen the movie with her then boyfriend, Jason. It was one of the few movies that had kept her attention from beginning to end, much to Jason's chagrin as she usually got a bit distracted by his warm lips, though it had caught his attention, too. There was just something about their chemistry, even on screen it had been so ridiculously powerful. It was just such a shame they'd fallen apart. Finally, Ana couldn't contain her sadness a moment longer, she simply had to voice it to the stranger next to her. With Ana, though, there really were no strangers. She had a way of just sort of instantly making someone her best friend, excepting the times she completely stuck her foot in her mouth, as she was about to do.

SHE NODDED EMPHATICALLY
when the man supplied a name, her memory jogged as soon as he named it. She was a bit surprised to hear a man agree with her sadness over the former celebrity romance, her eyes lifting away from the text she was reading to look up. She would acknowledge there were some straight men that were sensitive enough to agree with her, her fiancé for one, but most wouldn't really care. Looking over at the man catercorner to her, Anabel's blue eyes widened, sucking in a gasp of horror as she took in the familiar features of the "stranger." Ana had said some things with terrible timing plenty of times in the past, but this she was pretty sure topped it all. In general the things she had just said would make her feel awkward with anyone, but the fact that it was a celebrity, someone way more powerful and influential than she, made it ten, maybe one hundred, times worse.

COLOR FLOODED HER
cheeks and she looked around slightly panicky, having no idea what to do. "I, um," she bit her lip, faltering, letting the magazine drop into her lap to cover her red cheeks for a second. This would be that last time she engaged in any celebrity gossip, that was for sure. "Gosh, I am so sorry," she gushed, near to tears with embarrassment, though Anabel cried over just about everything lately with her out of control pregnancy hormones. When she'd burnt her bagel that morning she'd burst out crying and completely miffed her boyfriend, so it truly had nothing to do with the situation, but Dustin Freaking Harris wouldn't know that. As her magazine slid from her lap, the young woman pitched herself forward to catch it before wiping her eyes and standing with her head down, approaching the receptionist that had been watching the entertainment in her office. "Can I please get my schedule fixed now," she half hissed, her aforementioned pregnancy hormones making it tempting to just rip the other woman's hair out. It was clear she was playing spider solitaire and not, in fact, busy. When the woman again told her to sit down the blond spun around on her flats with aggravation, stalking back to the chair and ungracefully sitting down and resting her head in her hand.

ANA SAT IN SILENCE FOR A
while, unable to say a word, which was very unusual for her. Her cheeks were still flushed a deep red and she kept her eyes off of the rather attractive movie star. It was true, they were better looking in person, which was almost impossible to believe. It was a rather long while before she finally got her nerve back, her eyes slowly rotating to look at him for a long moment. Shifting to sit up she crossed her legs, still gazing at him with a defeated gaze. "I can't believe I did that. Gosh," she pretty much spoke to herself, shaking her head, "Sorry. I have a huge mouth." Annie shrugged, thinking back for a moment to the time she'd mentioned her rather... healthy sex life with her boyfriend to his ex-girlfriend. She just did stuff like that without ever meaning to; she didn't think, or look, before she spoke.

BOUNCING HER LEG AS SHE
thought, her gaze taking on a pensive, scrutinizing quality. It wasn't entirely her fault she'd done what she'd done. Celebrities weren't supposed to be wandering around Valkyrie, lest of all sitting in the registration offices of the local university. Granted he wasn't exactly welcome in Hollywood at the moment, but why on earth was he here of all places? Voicing her curiosity, her sweet voice hit the air, "What on earth are you doing in Valkyrie, anyway," she asked, not really caring that she was being nosy. He didn't have to answer the question if he didn't want to, that was always her policy.

WORD COUNT: 947
OUTFIT: here
NOTES: shooort. sorry. :(

[/center]

[Christopher 'Dustin' Harris]

DUSTIN HARRIS,

- - - - -

I'VE GOTTA SAY RESPECTFULLY I WOULD LIKE IT IF YOU TAKE
THE CAMERAS OFF OF ME CAUSE I JUST WANT A LITTLE ROOM
to breathe can you please respect my privacy
- - - - -

Dustin had known this would happen, this whole out of control media frenzy. He'd known it as soon as he woke up the morning after that fateful night and had twenty missed calls on his cell phone from his family, his agent and manager. Something had told him then that something was very very wrong and oh, how he'd been right. The moment he heard his manager's horrified 'Oh Dustin." he knew. Somehow the stupid press had been alerted and he'd bet a million dollars that Jenna had been the one to leak the news somehow. He certainly hadn't told anyone. As soon as he'd left the house he drove straight to his parent's place to avoid everything and he'd barely even given them a decent explanation so they couldn't and wouldn't have told anyone. This isn't the kind of thing you want your son to go through, even if he does deserve it.

Did he deserve all of this crap though? Did he deserve to be booted off the two movies he had lined up to begin filming soon? Did he deserve to lose all of his sponsers and companies he was a spokesman for? Did he really deserve that? Dustin found that question extremely debatable. Sure, what he had done to his now ex-girlfriend was awful and of course he felt bad for doing that to her. But he'd been drunk and in the wrong state of mind to be dealing with a cheating girlfriend. Yeah, about that. No one was talking about Jenna cheating on him were they? Dustin had just has much a right to hate her as she hated him. So people who said 'there is no excuse for what you did' to him were just pissing him off now. They didn't know what he had to deal with. He wasn't the only one dealing with pain here. He'd caught the girl he'd been planning on proposing to sleeping with someone he considered to be his biggest enemy and even a possible threat to him and his career. Dustin was dealing with a lot of pain right now so Jenna had no right to go around talking about how much pain he had caused her and walking around in public with red eyes. She was such an attention seeker, worse than him. She clearly knew the media would be watching her every move now so she got her eyes to look red and then wandered around and the next thing you know there's a new article about how broken Jenna is and how awful Dustin was for causing all this damage to her. Boohoo. This was her fault anyway. So no, Dustin didn't deserve all of this.

Watching the girl flicking through her magazine out of the corner of his eye, Dustin did spot the photo of Jenna and her bruises, put on display for the entire media-obsessed world to see. She looked even worse since she wasn't all made up so the bruises were even more obvious. Unable to look at Jenna for very long, Dustin flicked his eyes back to the ceiling until the girl spoke, commenting about the one thing that he was apparently unable to escape, however hard he tried. He was surprised that the blonde girl hadn't recognised him yet, not even when he so generously supplied her with the name of that stupid cursed movie. Then, of course, she looked up and then there was the widened blue eyes and a gasp. Dustin seemed to be getting that reaction a lot these days so you'd think he'd be getting used to it by now but he still felt a pang of annoyance. Once upon a time his presence had been recognised with an excited squeal, not a horrified gasp. How time and a scandal had changed all of that.

Still, at least this girl seemed a little sorry about her shocked reaction as she promptly stuttered an apology which was definitely a change. Dustin wasn't used to people apologising to him. People these days just assumed that however famous he was, he wasn't worth saying kind words to. It was reassuring to know he still had enough influence to generate an apology. But really, crying? Dustin raised an eyebrow slightly as the girl shed a couple of tears. "Uh, no problem. Not your fault." he said flatly, watching as she nearly dropped the stupid magazine on the floor. Well maybe she was PMSing or something. God, why were women so annoying and weird? Not long after he spoke, the girl jumped up and attempted to hurry up the receptionist. She failed of course. Dustin watched boredly as the lady told her to sit back down in one of those 'i'm so much better than you' tones. Seriously? Receptionists had nothing on him. You didn't need much to become a receptionist, well not that Dustin knew about anyway.

He didn't say anything as the blonde sat back down, seemingly still embarrassed about what she had said before. Well it was good to know that he still had power over some people. No one really seemed to care that he was famous now did they? People didn't care that he had been making blockbuster movies since he was seven and was one of the highest earning movie stars in Hollywood right now. Whatever, it had to blow over eventually. Right now he just had to make do with what he could and if that meant putting up with emotional blondes in this weird town, so be it. "I can't believe I did that. Gosh." Dustin glanced back at the girl apologising and shrugged back. "Whatever. You're better than some." he said dryly, thinking of the rest of the public who had no problem screaming abuse straight at him. Dustin shifted in his seat slightly, throwing a look over at the receptionist but she seemed to be in no hurry to help him out. The girl wasn't done talking though. At her question, Dustin turned back to look at her with a raised eyebrow. "Well I figured it was better to get away from all of the media crap for a bit. Apparently it's harder to escape than I thought."

- - - - -

STATUS; finished !
WORD COUNT; 1,038
TAGGED TO; anabel !
TIME/PLACE; 31st of august, around three o'clock / administration office, valkyrie university,
CREDITS; format inspired by lainey and other v-siders. lyrics from 'rumors' by lindsay lohan
OUTFIT; heree
NOTES; eh kind of a lame ending </3

- - - - -