The events of that night got filed away fast, buried under a schedule that had exploded the second her recovery period officially ended. A year of deferred obligations had apparently been waiting patiently to ambush her all at once.
Her comeback film remained the priority, but Lin Lin kept stacking sponsor renewals, contract negotiations, and promotional meetings on top of it regardless. Magazine interviews got pushed to the Declined pile entirely — "not the right time," Lin Lin decided, and Ding Jia didn't argue. Between script readings and costume fittings alone, her calendar had no breathing room left.
Luo Yang — Shen Ru, professionally, though she still hadn't fully adjusted to using either name consistently in her head — never reappeared after that strange night. He skipped the table read entirely, apparently uninterested in whether his hand-picked cast actually meshed well together.
She did meet most of her co-stars during that read-through, several of whom she'd worked with before and respected. His casting instincts, whatever they were built on, seemed to be paying off. Even the minor roles were filled with genuinely solid actors, which boded well for keeping retakes to a minimum once filming actually started.
No more bloodied women. No more frozen doorknobs. After that night, things had stayed reassuringly, almost suspiciously normal like it never happened.
Weeks slid by in the usual blur of bookings. She was midway through a fashion shoot in the middle of an actual desert: tents, sand, an actress she vaguely recognized as a rising B-lister sharing her makeup tent for the day, when she first heard it.
—shutter.
She didn't react. The crew photographed behind-the-scenes content almost all around the clock; a stray shutter click meant nothing. Her makeup artist kept dabbing color onto her cheekbones, debating shade choices with Yu Xia, who'd come along to oversee the look.
"Maybe a touch more bronze," Yu Xia said, eyeing the mirror. "The sun's going to wash out anything subtle—"
—shutter.
"—so we need more contrast against the dress."
"Which dress?" Ding Jia asked.
—shutter.
"The indigo one."
—shutter.
"What about the off-shoulder instead? Better against the backdrop, I think."
—shutter.
The conversation continued in fits and starts, punctuated by a shutter sound that simply would not stop. Ding Jia glanced behind her through the mirror's reflection — nothing. No one with a camera raised. No phones out.
She caught her assistant's eye instead. "Xiao Chan, is the photographer running test shots outside?"
Xiao Chan blinked, clearly thrown by the question. "...Jie?"
"The camera shutters. They won't stop."
A glance passed between Xiao Chan, Yu Xia, and the makeup artist all gave a small, confused, unanimous shrug.
"...The crew's still unpacking the equipment outside," Xiao Chan said carefully, reading the dangerous edge creeping into Ding Jia's mood. "The photographer hasn't even started setting up the monitors yet."
"And?"
"...No one's taken a single photo yet."
Ding Jia's expression went very still in the mirror.
—shutter.
Fudge. Of course.