Chapter 45 The Results #2
My feet touched the stage as Gabe set me down to accept our award before we were ushered to stand at the back of the stage in line with the rest of the winners.
We couldn’t stop the excitement we felt from coming out in quiet squeals and fits of giggles as we stood there waiting for the Overall Best Soloist award to be announced.
Another dancer on the end of the line even shushed us as the announcer called the winning soloist, and I tried to feel a little guilty over it, but truly, I couldn’t care.
I was just happy.
Turned out the winner for best soloist came from my old studio in New York. Gabe mumbled in my ear that she was a newer dancer there that mostly kept to herself and her craft, and that some of my old friends compared her to me in my absence from the studio.
At the very moment he told me that, she found my eye from across the stage. We shared in a short connection in which we both smiled and truthfully, I was happy for her and I hoped the studio I loved for so long treated her well.
“Best in Show is happening!” Gabe whispered in my ear, bringing me back into focus with a very sudden, very visceral panic.
“—This award is the highest honor we can give out to our dancers today. Its recipients have gone on to dance with The Paris Opera Ballet, The Australian Ballet, and the American Ballet Theatre. The winner or winners of this award tonight have big pointe shoes to follow in.”
The crowd again did that obligatory laugh at the announcers joke, but the dancers on stage were tight-lipped. Gabe and I were completely still and completely silent. Everyone on stage knew what this award meant. We all felt the weight of it.
Again, my eyes fell shut and I zeroed in on Gabe next to me.
His hand holding mine, his chest pressed to my back and the warmth he was radiating through.
His signature smell of citrus that had always dulled my panic and nerves in the past. I inhaled all of him I could, but frowned when the vibrations of my heart continued at the same restless pace.
Squeezing my eyes harder, I breathed deep the scent of my best friend that I had come to rely on for a quick anxiety fix over the years. Gabe always put me at ease.
But there was something missing.
Gabe’s light, citrusy smell wasn’t abating my rapidly beating heart like it should be. There was something off—something insufficient—and a fury flamed inside of me that it wasn’t working. I wanted to take that flame and melt my useless heart for malfunctioning at such an important time.
I wanted it to burn.
I…
Burn.
My eyes flew open as the realization bulleted through the very heart I was shaming. I knew why Gabe’s once calming scent wasn’t working. I knew why it felt and smelled off.
Because it wasn’t burnt.
He didn’t smell like fresh soap that had been melting in the center of a fire. He didn’t smell like the new aroma I’d fallen in love with and didn’t realize until this very second was my new serenity.
Ethan was my calm and my peace and my heart. And my soul ached profoundly that he wasn’t here right now. Especially as the announcer called those final winners and my entire world flipped.
“The 2020 Winners for Best in Show, Alice Monroe and Gabe Parisi!”
The next few minutes went by in a muffled blur.
There were screams of praise and plenty of tears.
Tons of shaking hands and nodding ‘thank you’s’ to everyone who congratulated us.
Gabe and I took what felt like a hundred pictures as we made our way down the stage and into the pit of the audience.
The floor was packed with people, half of which were trying to get our attention to congratulate us or ask what our plans after this were.
Gabe did most of the talking for us, and I just stood next to him, saying what I hoped were the right things because none of it made sense to me. Everything coming out of my mouth sounded like another language.
We’d won. I’d won.
This was the moment I’d been working for and putting mountains of pressure on myself to win, and I did it. I finally got my win and… it felt like the win slipped out of the gaping hole in my heart as quickly as it was put there.
In the chaos of the moment, I blinked back the tears that stung my eyes and swallowed their accompanying ball of pain that had risen in my throat.
Now was not the time to cry over a boy I lost. Now was not the time to lose myself in thoughts of him and the list of growing regrets I had over how our last moments had played out.
Now wasn’t the time to wonder if he would be here right now if we hadn’t fought.
Now was a time for celebration and networking for a future without Ethan Black.
“Uh, Alice?” Gabe’s voice pulled my attention back, leaning my head up to him.
“What?”
He wasn’t staring back at me like I was him. No, his eyes were trained straight forward in the same direction he nodded his head in. Curious and confused, I turned my head to follow Gabe’s line of sight.
The slightest gasp sucked between my teeth as I found what Gabe was staring at.
In that second, my heart disconnected from my brain and all I saw was blue.
Not just any blue though—the most stunning color of blue in all of existence.
Bluer than the ocean. Bluer than the sky.
All the hues of blue had mixed together to create this perfect shade, and it alone had the power to hypnotize my heart to do what it said.
The eyes that were dressed in the magnificent blue told me to come here, and so I did.
They told me they were sorry and begged for forgiveness, and so I forgave.
On my path to him, my heart reached out into every part of me and was working my body like a puppet, pushing my legs faster and quickening my steps to get to him.
In no time at all, I had broken out into a full sprint before my heart found his, and I leapt up into his arms and he caught me like I knew he would.
What sounded like a dry sob broke past my lips as I hugged him, breathing in the smell of him that whirled around my heart until it was sated and happy at last to have him back. My lungs filled up with all of him I could take in and he held me so tightly, I was sure he was doing the same.
“You’re here,” I breathed, amazement painting my words.
“I wouldn’t have missed it.” His hand stroked the back of my neck. “You were so beautiful up there, Slim. So beautiful.”
Ethan’s adoring nickname for me melted whatever reservations I had left, and I pushed myself out of the crook of his neck to look at him.
“You saw the dance?”
He cracked my most favorite smile in the whole world, and it lit up his entire face.
“I was watching the whole time.” His hand pushed back into my loose hair, thumb caressing over the top of my ear. “I’m so proud of you.”
Hearing his pride for me curled in another set of tears, distorting the perfect sight of him. Ethan saw the tears and moved his thumb to catch them. I rested my head into his hand that cupped the side of my face and sighed at the unparalleled feeling of his touch.
“I’m so happy you’re here,” I whispered against the palm of his hand. “Winning without you here didn’t feel like winning at all.”
Love relaxed the hard lines drawn into his forehead.
“I shouldn’t love hearing that, but I really do.”
We both stifled soft laughter, allowing our heads to fall together. Our noses kissed and our lips were almost there too.
“I’m so sorry for what I said,” I began, the skin of Ethan’s thumb brushing my lips to a stop.
“I know how much you love to apologize, but this one’s on me.
” Shaking his head against mine, he admitted, “I just didn’t do so hot with the thought of never being with you again after last night.
You told me it was only one night, and I didn’t want to accept it, and I’m sorry for ever making you feel like you had to choose. I never should have said that.”
“But you were right.” My train of thought shifted towards my conversation with Hannah. “Even if we stop seeing each other now, it doesn’t stop the lies. They’re already out there, and every day I don’t tell her the truth, it gets worse.”
A blip of excitement twitched his eyebrows up, and he blinked.
“What are you saying?”
Some of the best and worst emotions known to the human heart stampeded mine all at once. Love, fear, bliss, and shame all overwhelmed my overworked heart with the notion of getting my happily ever after with Ethan and the crippling terror of admitting my horrific betrayal to Monica.
But maybe I could have the best of both worlds if I came clean to Monica now.
Maybe she would only be mad for a while, but forgive me because I told her instead of lying to her for the rest of our lives.
She loved me and I loved her and I was sure our bond as sisters was strong enough to withstand this if I went about it the right way.
I just had to do it right. Tactful . Carefully .
“I’m saying…” I trailed off, intentionally teasing the suspense of the moment.
Ethan’s arms around my body grew tighter as both of our excitements rose, the idea of what I was proposing becoming clear. Us . Together. Finally able to love each other in public as we do in secret. My eyes followed my fingers as they brushed along his hairline, curving my hand over his ear.
As I traced my fingers’ steps, something just off of the horizon of my hand snagged my attention.
I looked once, and then twice.
And then my smile vanished.
The third time my eyes jumped back to the thing that stole my focus is when it set in.
The dread.
It washed through my body like ice water that had been dumped over my head.
Its impact hit hard and fast, tearing the breath straight from my lungs and the hope straight from my heart.
Just over Ethan’s shoulder stood the picture perfect face of someone who’d just found a knife sticking out of their back.
Her name slipped out of me like a sin.
“Monica.”