A/N: This story has been posted twice before, so if you think you've read it before you probably have. This version has been massively edited. By that I mean that about half of the scenes were completely rewritten and some of the plot was changed along the way. I had to cut a lot of stuff I loved, but I got to add new stuff too.

Chapter One

I felt a jolt in my calves as my feet clomped along the pavement of the residential street in Beverly Hills. The warm air swirling around me was filled with the scent of flowers from the gardens in the neighborhood. A morning jog was a daily activity for me as I worked to keep in shape. It was important in my line of work to always look your best.

I turned the corner down the next street, squinting as the morning sun landed in my eyes. I really needed to learn to get up before sunrise to start my run. The sun could be brutal on the eyes. I set my sunglasses in place on my nose, and picked up speed as I rounded the next corner. I was about to hit what I called the home stretch, and I liked to hit it at my highest speed.

When the faint shape of my house came into view, I slowed to a brisk walk, so that I could ease into the stop I was about to make. The leaves on the palm trees around me rustled with the gentle breeze, and I enjoyed the sight as I began to catch my breath and turn down the walkway to my front door.

I walked through the door of my house to the sound of my ringing cell phone. I ran to the kitchen and picked it up off the counter, filling a glass with water as I flipped the phone open.

"Hannah Hale," I answered in my cheeriest voice.

"Miss Hale, it's Jerry. I was wondering if you'd read the script I sent you."

I rolled my eyes as I listened to my agent's droning voice explain the importance of making this movie with Nancy Francis. This was roughly the hundredth time I'd received the same call in the past week.

"I'm considering it, Jerry," I answered in a voice that sounded much merrier than I felt. "I'm just not sure exactly what it is that I want to do at the moment."

"What do you mean you're not sure? This is a great opportunity for your career. Ms. Francis is a top director, and this picture is a sure Oscar nominee. You absolutely must do it."

"I'm still getting over For the Love," I said as I grabbed the newspaper off the kitchen table and walked toward the living room. I waved at my mother, who was coming down the stairs before taking a seat on the plush, fluffy sofa.

"Miss Hale, your first film has done wonders for you. You have a unique opportunity right now. You've moved out of the world of pseudo-celebrity and become a star. If you're ever going to make a film of this quality, now is the time."

I stifled a laugh as I glanced at the headlines on the front page of the LA Times. "I'm seriously considering a break, Jerry. This whole fame thing has been taking a lot out of me recently."

"You must be joking. What happened to the young girl I met two years ago? You couldn't wait to become a big star."

"I was fifteen. Every fifteen-year-old girl wants to be Audrey Hepburn. Right now, I don't want to think about what's best for my career. I want to think about what's best for me."

I could hear Jerry fumbling for words on the other end of the phone. "Isn't your career what's best for you?" he said after a long pause.

I laughed. "I'm not even eighteen yet, Jerry. I think that I should back off a little. Try my hand at a normal life before I get into another big movie."

"How can you say no to Nancy Francis? This is a once in a lifetime opportunity."

"I'm not saying no. I just need to think about it."

"Well, think fast, Miss Hale, I know plenty of young actresses who would love to take this role away from you if you wait too long."

"Okay, Jerry," I said, relieved to finally have the opportunity to shut him up. "I'll call you when I've made my decision." I flipped my cell phone shut, and turned my attention to the newspaper.

I put my feet up on the coffee table, stretching out as my muscles began to relax after the miles I'd jogged that morning. It felt good to just relax for a few minutes. I rarely had the option anymore. It seemed that everywhere I went someone wanted me to do something for them. That was fame. I'd dreamed for so long about the blissful life of the rich and famous, but the truth is, it just made my life crazy, complicated, and public.

My little sister barreled into the room and plopped onto the large armchair by the window. I turned my gaze toward her and felt jealousy hit me as my eyes focused on her petite body lounging and tearing into a new book. At fifteen, she was still leading a normal life. She went to a public high school and she had normal friends. Her eyes were full of innocence and youth as she wandered around the world in the daze that high school inflicted on its victims.

"What are you looking at?" she snapped, noticing that I was staring at her.

"Nothing. I was thinking."

"Did Jerry talk you into taking that part yet?"

"No, but he's not giving up."

"I don't understand you. You have everything, and you act like you want to give it all away."

"I have nothing, Eve. The fame has taken my life from me. Don't you understand how lucky you are to be able to be a normal kid?"

"What are you talking about? This is what you wanted. You've worked your entire life for it. How could you even think about letting go of it?"

"It's a lot to deal with. I never thought that this one movie would get me here. It's not like any of the TV shows I did brought me this kind of fame."

"And I say it's a miracle. You're never going to have a chance to make a film with Nancy Francis again."

"I know. I should do it. I just wish that for a little while I could pretend I was a normal girl."

"But you're not," she said, prancing out of the living room toward the breakfast that was waiting for her in the kitchen.

A thought rolled through my mind at that moment, but I dismissed it. It was a ridiculous idea and only a fool would actually want to try it. I threw the paper aside, and pulled the script off the coffee table, settling down to decide what to do with the next year of my life.

---

"Please tell me this is a joke," Jerry scoffed as he looked at me across the table. He had taken me to lunch to discuss that Francis film again. We were sitting at a private table in the back of my favorite restaurant, Veronica's. I was such a loyal customer that there was always a table reserved for me by the window.

"I've never been a normal high school student, Jerry. How can they expect me to play one?"

"You're almost eighteen. You must know something about playing a character that is about your age."

"But not enough to be convincing. Not enough to be sure that the audience would buy it."

"And you expect the studio to finance this?"

"It's worth a shot. I'm doing it as research for the part. I don't see why they would object."

"Because it's a childish idea."

"Maybe, but it's something that I want to do, with or without the studio's help."

"Are you saying you won't do the film unless you can go through with this ridiculous stunt?"

"Why not? Now's the time to make demands, right?"

"This is insane, Miss Hale. I'm telling you that they'll never go along with it."

"It's five days a week, seven hours a day. I could work around it. I could do much better work around it than I ever could around my old schedule."

"It's high school. There will be other students, homework, and teachers. Why would you want to go back to that?"

"Because I never went to it in the first place. Besides, it would give me the ability to see if I'm actually any good at this racquet before I get in too far to turn back."

"I think you've already passed that point."

"Jerry, just think about it," I pleaded, "pitch the idea to the studio and see if they bite."

"You want me to pitch this?"

"You are my agent."

"I can't pitch it. If this means so much to you, you should pitch it yourself."

I sighed. Jerry was quite frustrating. If he hadn't bombarded me with insults, I would have thought that he wasn't listening to me at all. The entire time I was talking to him, his dark eyes scanned the fake marble posts of the room and the shining crystal chandelier in the center of the ceiling.

I pushed the vegetables on my plate around as I stared into the space in front of me. "You really think it's crazy?"

"I do. There's no way that Nancy Francis would go for an idea like that."

I looked down at the mess of uneaten food on my plate and let Jerry's words sink in. Maybe I'd been right to dismiss the idea at first. Maybe it was a foolish thought.

I rolled my shoulders back, and set my face in the best professional position I could manage. "I want to try it out on her," I said, hoping that I sounded more confident about the idea than I felt.

---

"So, what I want, Ms. Francis, is to spend a semester in a normal high school as a means of researching my character for the film," I said to the full-length mirror that hung on the inside of my closet door. I was a firm believer in watching your own facial expressions as you practiced for a big speech or scene. The meeting that Jerry had scheduled with the studio for the next week was the biggest challenge I'd ever had, and I knew that it would take a lot of practice to prepare me to pitch my plan to Nancy.

I cleared my throat and began speaking again. "My idea, Ms. Francis," I began, "is to spend a semester as a normal high school student. I could acquire the proper materials from the wardrobe department and register at my sister's high school. I believe that it would be a useful way for me to learn about the experience of a… oh, that's absolute shit."

I smacked myself on the forehead as punishment for my stupidity, and flopped down on the deep purple bedspread of my soft queen-sized bed. "This is hopeless," I groaned, burying my head in the lumps of my feather pillow.

The honking of a horn outside my window pulled me from my depression, and I dragged myself out of bed to see who could possibly be making so much noise at one o'clock in the morning. Pulling the curtain to one side and hiding behind it, I turned my gaze to a place just below my window. I was shocked to see the shining of a silver sports car parked in front of our house.

The door to my house whispered open and I turned my eyes down to the sight of my sister going out into the night. Eve glanced in every direction as she moved soundlessly through our lawn. Her blue eyes lit with mischief as they fluttered across my window. She motioned toward the sports car, and the passenger side door opened.

From my vantage point, I could just make out the figure of a boy in the driver's seat. His hands were tapping the surface of his steering wheel presumably in beat to a song as Eve climbed in beside him. She planted a kiss on his cheek before slamming the door after her.

As I watched the light of the streetlamp shine off the moving vehicle, I felt a pang of fear. I didn't have any idea where my little sister was going with this boy, but I knew that her sneaking off in the middle of the night was not a good sign. I returned the curtain to its original position, and allowed myself to plop back on the bed before working on my pitch again.

What Eve was up to didn't concern me. It was her life to screw up, and it was probably innocent anyway. She was, after all, only fifteen. It wasn't likely that she was sleeping with him.

I turned my attention back to my own problems, pulled myself out of bed and returned to the chair in front of the mirror. I knew that I had to come up with something to say to Nancy about my plan, but I didn't know what. I picked up my pen and notepad and jotted down the most important aspects of my plan.

"What I would like of you, Ms. Francis," I tried again, "is a chance at learning my part in a way that would otherwise be impossible. I would like to spend a semester at Beverly Hills High School studying the lives of the students…"

The words flew out of my mouth, but I paid little attention to them. Despite the importance of this meeting for me, my mind just wasn't in it that night. I continued to practice these horrible pitches until late into the night, all along pretending that I wasn't using it as an excuse to wait up for Eve.

---

"Miss Hale," a tall woman with bright bleached blonde hair said as she extended her hand for me to shake. "I am Nancy Francis; it is a pleasure to meet you at last."

I took her hand in mine and shook it with quite a bit of force. I took a moment to look her up and down, noticing that her tight lipstick red skirt suit was a contrast with both her age and her pale skin tone. Her lips seemed to drown in the red makeup that was plastered over them.

"Nancy," I said after a pause, "I've been looking forward to this."

She flashed me an overly forced smile as she directed for me to sit in the chair that faced her desk. "Mr. Williams tells me that you have an idea you want to discuss with me."

"Yes. I have read the script for your next film, and I love it. I would be interested in taking the part of Ana; however, I'm afraid that I'm not familiar enough with high school life to accurately portray her."

"Miss Hale, if you wanted to turn down the role, you did not have to come here at all."

"No, you don't understand. I want the part. I have an idea that might allow me to prepare myself for it."

"And what is this idea?"

"I'd like to go to high school for a semester."

"Go to high school? How could you possibly manage that?"

"I would acquire a believable costume from the wardrobe department here at the studio. Then I would register at my sister's high school, and attempt to pass myself off as her cousin. Through this process, I could learn about the lives and interests of normal high school students. I think that this would be a value to all of us both in filming and promoting the movie."

Nancy's nearly translucent blue eyes jumped around the room as she contemplated the idea. She rested her chin on her hand and tapped her front teeth with her manicured fingernail. Her motion made a clicking sound that resonated throughout the room.

"Well," she said at last, "I find the idea intriguing. There are just a few problems. Getting you into the high school should be easy enough. We probably will not even have to tell the faculty who you really are. As long as we can find time for you to film, I can see this idea working. The studio execs, however, are going to want to know what they have to gain from it."

"Aside from the understanding I'll gain of high school and high school students?"

"Right. The studio is not exactly big on the idea of supporting endeavors that do not pay off fairly well."

"You want me to make this pay off? I thought it would pay off just fine in helping me to give you a command performance."

"True, but monetarily, we will have the same publicity of having Hannah Hale in the film either way."

She began tapping her teeth again while I let her words sink in. "So, you're not going to support it?"

"That is not what I said. I have an idea for how we can make all this work for the studio."

My eyes widened with interest as I looked at Nancy. "Which is?"

"We use it for publicity. We call the whole thing a stunt to promote the film and then you return to the school as yourself to sign autographs for all the kids. We will make you look like a nice girl that wants to get closer to your neighborhood, particularly the youth of your neighborhood."

My mouthed dropped as I processed the words. "You want to turn my experiment into a publicity stunt?"

"Right, Miss Hale, and this is the only way that I can support it."

"You've got to be kidding me. This thing means the world to me and you're turning it into a stunt."

"It is a risk, and the studio cannot take it if it is not going to bring them profits."

"How is it a risk for the studio?"

"If you do not pull it off, a lot of information about this film can get out. This production is secretive and we cannot risk that on one of the youngest stars in Hollywood."

I bit my lip trying to force my anger to subside. "I'm not going to talk you out of this, am I?"

"Not a chance."

"But I can't do this without the studio's help."

Nancy's lips curved into a Joker-esque wide smile. "I know that."

"Then you know I have to do it your way."

"Miss Hale, you do not have to do it at all. If you want the part that we offered you, then you have to do it my way. If not, I do not care what you do."

I felt resentment boil up inside of me. No matter what, Nancy's way would leave me hating her. "We have a deal," I said, knowing that it wasn't a deal I particularly wanted to make. "Draw up the paperwork and send it to my lawyer."

"Of course," Nancy said, returning the phony smile to her face. "My people will call yours."

I fought the urge to groan as I nodded at Nancy and let myself out of her office. "I can't wait."

A/N: As you can tell if you've read this before, it is really different that it used to be. If you haven't read it before, welcome and thanks for reading. Please let me know what you think by reviewing or sending me an email at Thanks again. --Bridge