"But what have you done?" Laurence asked, sounding horrified.
"Flawless skin…" she smirked. She had just cut the person's eyes and mouth from the picture and pasted it over the image of a boiled and peeled egg. "Don't tell me… you thought I would be good at this?"
Laurence broke out into laughter as they tagged the person in their respective posts.
As they continued to film, various weird requests came in. From turning people into imaginary creatures to cropping people out of images after a breakup, all sorts of requests had come in.
One request stood out from all the others. [Edit a picture to show how you want your relationship with Rinsten to be.]
Katherine stared flabbergasted as Laurence scratched his head.
"Are we being trapped?" Suspiciously, he looked over towards Ian. The man in question grinned but shook his head. He hadn't instigated this. The fandom just wanted something more to ship. Confirmation from the parties in question.
"It seems that way." Katherine was puzzled. This seemed like a great opportunity to stop people from making stories. Deny all rumors and start with a clean slate. "Why don't we take a stab at it." She smiled, a wicked gleam in her eyes.
Laurence nodded, feeling ecstatic. His eyes wandered off to her as she worked. He could barely concentrate on his own piece because Katherine kept scrunching her brows and biting her lip as she figured out how to portray the scene.
"Are you done yet?" he asked, impatiently. Despite being distracted, he had somehow finished faster than her.
"Just making finishing touches!" she explained quickly. She licked her lips and hid her smile as she looked over the edited picture one last time. "Done," she pronounced finally. The images were projected onto the monitor and Katherine marveled her masterpiece for a second.
Laurence remained in stunned silence. To make up for it, Katherine started to comment on his artwork. "Oh, it's actually very well done," she scrutinized the other's work. He had put together screenshots of them from their videos to make it look like they were gaming together in the room he had filmed in for the past decade. The familiar setting and proximity between the two of them could be seen as friendship or more according to what the audience wanted to think.
"I wanted to show how I want my friendship with you should look like. The two of us laughing and gaming." He arranged his expression accordingly and smiled at her.
"You put in a little Shrek in the background as an Easter egg, I see," Katherine snickered. "Judge mine," she compelled. Her eyes were eager but she suppressed her true emotions wonderfully in front of the strangers. She, too, had kept some Easter eggs in the picture.
There was a pronounced wall in the picture acting as a barrier between Laurence and Katherine. While he was in proper clothes, she was dressed as a nun. In the distance, you could see a church and nothing more than that. In reality. She had placed small pictures of Cage throughout her side of the image. Even though it was not evident, Katherine felt smug about it.
Let's see if anyone figured that one out.
No, she wasn't playing with fire. If anyone noticed, she would just tell them that she was a die hard fan. It would collaborate with her other accounts where she constantly gushed about Cage before she met him face to face. She couldn't see any problem.
"I have never been rejected so politely in my life," Laurence laughed his heart out. He stared at the image in sheer delight. "Bride of God?" he asked after further inspection.
"Of course. But you won't find out who my God is." She pouted when she heard Angelina snicker. She turned to her friend with a c.o.c.ky grin.
"You've used this example before, haven't you?" Laurence protested lightly. "I demand a new way to reject me. You say, isn't the motto for this collaboration 'break your follower's heart'?"
Katherine shrugged as she rendered the image and sent it out to the person who had posted it.
[Rinsten: Sorry, I am taken.] She attached the photo and then sent it over.
They said their goodbyes to the audience after a couple more edits to relieve the awkwardness. The cameras were turned off before Ian started to speak. He seemed bothered and irritated by the whole ordeal but remained mostly polite.
"You're a very funny girl, Katherine," he said with a little hostility.
"I would like to think so," she retorted.
"You must be offended about the post yesterday but a lot of people pretend to be together to get more attention on social media." The words were said so lightly said that Katherine felt even more offended. So, this was how Cage felt when everyone told him he was wrong for not wanting to lie about his relationsh.i.p.s.
"Ah, so this is what it feels like," she whispered with a sigh. Ian looked at her curiously but she didn't say much more on the topic. "I was offended. Thank you for understanding that so quickly."
"I felt your hostility." Katherine's eyes roamed over Ian's face trying to find any trace of guilt for what he had done. None. Ian was too engrossed in his role as a manager or whatever he thought he was to think about other people and their worries.
"Find some time to look around you and see how others feel when you act irrationally. I'm not a person who wants to be entangled in rumors and seen under a critical light. If I liked someone, I would like to keep it to myself and nurture feelings." What she meant by that was, 'I don't like your friend, don't make me rebel and expose you.'
She had confidence that her subtle threat. It felt great to have people back her up. She could act more shamelessly without thinking about the repercussions. Moreover, she had studied Cage's interviews closely to see how he handled such situations. With how closely she watched Cage, one could say she had become a second-hand expert at hiding her threats behind sweet words.