Confused, Elsa hit the play button on the video. The video was a fan or paparazzi video of Darla Darling. Darla was sitting at an outdoor table at a café, having lunch with a friend. She was laughing, chatting and enjoying her food. But someone had attached an audio file to the clip. Elsa turned up the sound. Sweat broke out on Elsa’s forehead as she heard herself say:
‘And now, can you believe this shit? She must have spent the last three months sitting at home eating bloody Woolworths mud cakes, because she’s put on like, twenty kilos.’
She heard Nathan’s response:
‘Elsa, come on.’
And her reply:
‘I’m serious. We’re not talking like a little extra curve here. We’re talking about a girl who went from looking like Bambi with tatts to looking like a dollar-store Robyn Henson in three months! I love Robyn. She’s fabulous. But first of all, Darla is not Robyn, and also, I’m not hiring a plus-size model for my brand. That’s not my offering. I don’t make anything over a size fourteen, just for starters. Plus-size is just not my market.’
Elsa pressed her hand to her stomach. She felt dizzy, felt like she was going to be sick. The clip played on a loop. Elsa watched the video three times, frozen in the kitchen as Doris’s crying reached peak complaint. She was paralysed, unable to move forward or flick off the video. The comments were flooding in. Women who were genuinely horrified, hurt or upset; many others who just loved a dumpster fire.
I’ve been buying Elsa’s stuff since her first pop-up in Byron. I supported her even when she messed up with all that shipping chaos a couple of years ago. But this shit is foul.
Robyn Henson wouldn’t wear Elsa Anderson’s stuff for any amount of money. And this is why. Classless.
Yeah. And this is why the body positivity movement fails. Because scrape just beneath the surface and all those fake skinny bitches think like this.
What a cow.
No one I know would be caught dead in her stuff.
Never heard of her. Talk about the wrong way to go viral!
OMG DD is going to SUE her ass!
The comments were coming in faster than Elsa could read them. The post already had six hundred thousand views and it was going up fast. Hundreds of people had already tagged Darla. About the same number had tagged Robyn Henson. Elsa sat heavily on one of her bar stools. Her body felt disconnected from her brain. With clumsy fingers, she left the post with the audio clip and checked Robyn and Darla’s feeds. Neither of them had commented yet. But they would. They absolutely would. And when they did, six hundred thousand views would look like chicken feed.
She had to fix this. Shehadto.
Doris was still crying.
‘Doree, come on. Let’s watchBluey, okay?’
She picked Doris up and carried her through to the living room. She switched on another episode ofBluey, cuddled with Doris until Doris was caught up in the show, then retreated to the doorway and called her lawyer.
‘Brian. Hi. How are you?’ Elsa tried hard for a breezy note.
‘Elsa, great, great. I got your email. So you want to find a way out of the Darla Darling contract? I’m sorry to tell you that there isn’t—’
‘What? Oh my god, no. That’s what I get for writing an email in a hurry.’ Elsa’s mind was racing. No one could know she had tried to get out of her contract with Darla. If they did, there would be no denying the story. She could trust her lawyer—couldshe?—but she was suddenly sure that shecouldn’ttrust her own phone. ‘I’m so sorry. I was distracted by the kids. That’s not what I meant at all. The absolutelastthing I want to do is get out of the contract. Why would I want that?’
There was a pause on the other end of the line. ‘I... see. Well, that’s great. Because I—’
‘What I want to know is what my options are if Darla walks away.’
‘Your options?’
‘I want to know what levers I can pull to keep her under contract. If she decides to walk away, what can I do to make her stay?’
‘Well, there’s the money, of course.’
‘The money won’t be enough.’ Elsa’s heart was beating fast. She felt clammy with sweat. This scandal would go viral, of course it would, because it was absolute catnip. And Darla would tear up the contract and get another one for two or three times the money from another brand. She could ride the wave of publicity to get herself further up the influencer chain, and she would. She absolutely would. ‘The carrot won’t be enough. I need a stick.’
‘Okay. The only way Darla can legally break the contract at the moment would be if you fail to pay her. Clause twenty-six says that if you miss a payment by more than seven days, she can give you notice, and if you fail to remedy your failure within a further fourteen days, then she—’
‘I’m not going to miss any payments.’ Elsa said it with absolute confidence. Her bank account was creaking at the seams, but the first rule of business was never to show weakness.
