Sunday morning, 1st February, 1925, 822 Wilcox Avenue
She walked back inside the small cottage that morning, banging the door behind her, and threw the newspaper down on the table with a clunk. Her mother calls: Lotus? She doesn’t reply.
Two more papers, two more headlines, and another reminder. A headline ran: ‘Movie Publicity Men Pick This Year’s Baby Stars; 13 on List.’
This was a double spread with the exact same story that ran the day before. Another printed high quality photographs of them all. Lotus was not among them. What insufferable bores they all sounded, anyway.
Ena and Olive. She clenched her teeth when she thought about how Roach dressed her in baby clothes, then chose Olive and Ena to be WAMPAS babies, completely ignoring her. She thought about how she came to Los Angeles for more than that. Wishing she could scream aloud, the words pierced her mind.
‘I will prove my worth! I am going through with it!’
She sat, sinking into silence.
Mother banked everything on this, her father helped to fund this trip, everyone believed in her but here she was, they got there in March, so it was almost a year. She had one year to do it, and if it didn’t work out, she would go home…Well February had arrived, so it was now or never.
She had risen from the ranks of body double, thankfully, something she never imagined she would have to say. The curse of the too pretty legs had followed her, and she wasn’t being taken seriously. She was turning 21 this year, in September. It was time. She didn’t want to let them down, mostly, she didn’t want to let herself down.
That day, Lotus changed the narrative and took control of her destiny. She would capture the attention of an entire city, a country, the world—not with a role, but with a rebellion; the entire world would see her, hear her, and listen – to her.
In desperation and fury, it began…
Lotus Thompson: Silent Film Star 
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