Chapter 13
MIRROR, MIRROR
Holly
“It was one time. One very specific, very unholy time. The end.”
Holly took the long way ‘home’.
Past the corner store with the mural of Selena that had faded under fifteen years of sun and smog.
Across the cracked basketball court where she'd learned to juke boys twice her size.
Past the little swing set she used to leap off, wild-haired and barefoot, landing in the dirt like a champion gymnast with scraped knees and something to prove.
The scent of grilled carne asada from someone’s porch mixed with the sharp bite of exhaust. A dog barked three houses down. The neighbors were yelling in two languages. It all felt like background noise to her soul.
Her mother’s house sat under the one streetlight that always flickered like it had stage fright.
The screen door still creaked, the front steps still wobbled, and the porch light buzzed like it was muttering secrets.
But the moment she stepped inside, she exhaled. Lemon Pine-Sol. Garlic. Cilantro. Home.
“Mija!” her mom called from the kitchen, wearing a threadbare apron that said Kiss the Chef in sequins that had lost their shine. “I made arroz con pollo! Sit! It’s still hot.”
“Mamá, you’re supposed to be resting.”
“I’m resting while stirring! It counts.”
Her mom waved her off with a spoon like a wand.
Holly could see the strain in her eyes and the tightness around her smile.
The faint shake in her hand, too. But she didn’t say anything.
She just took over setting the table and made sure her back was to her mom so her shrewd protector didn’t see the worry flash across her face.
Dinner was soft conversation, easy chewing, reruns of Reina de Corazones playing low on the old TV in the living room.
They talked about Take the Floor. Her mom was obsessed.
Of course she was. In Holly’s experience, Latin mothers loved two things more than anything: telenovelas and asking invasive questions.
“So.” Her mom sighed, settling back like the effort had finally caught up to her. Holly reached for her glass, throat tight, pretending not to notice. Her mom took a bite of chicken. “This Nate…”
Holly could just imagine that Joker gif, with Heath Ledger gesturing like a deranged band conductor.
And here we go.
“He’s just my dance partner,” Holly said, too quickly.
“Mmhmm. He dances like he wants to die on your hips.”
Holly almost choked on her rice.
Her mom sipped her Agua de Jamaica like she hadn’t just lobbed a verbal grenade. “What? I have eyes. And I have taste. That man is… tall.”
“Mamá,” Holly groaned.
“I’m just saying,” she continued, lifting one hand like she was praising a higher power. “He looks at you like he already loves you. That scares you, doesn’t it?”
The silence that followed was louder than the TV. Louder than her fork scraping her plate. Louder than the ache Holly had been ignoring since the moment she saw him.
“We’re focused on the win. That’s it. We’re not…”
She trailed off. Couldn’t finish the lie.
Her mom didn’t press. Just finished her dinner like she hadn’t gutted her daughter with a sentence. Holly eventually stood, taking their plates to the sink before her mom could see the crack in her composure.
Behind her, she heard her mom sigh again. And then, that cough. Wet, heavy, and sharp. Holly froze with one hand on the faucet, the other clenched tight.
It passed, and her mom laughed it off. “Too much pepper.”
Bullshit. But Holly pretended she believed the lie. Like she wasn’t doing nightly math in her head, calculating chemo bills, grocery lists, and shoe repair costs while trying to choreograph a goddamn fairytale for cameras.
She dried the dishes in silence. Her mom curled up on the couch, blanket around her shoulders, pretending not to be exhausted.
By the time Holly turned off the lights and kissed her forehead goodnight, her mom was already asleep.
Holly lingered in the doorway. Watched her chest rise and fall. Quiet. Fragile.
“I’ve got you, Mamá,” she whispered. “I swear.”
Outside, the air was cool against her skin.
East Hollywood never looked glamorous, but it knew how to dream.
The Hollywood sign twinkled in the distance like a cruel promise, just visible over the rooftops from this angle.
Same as it had been her whole life. She didn’t have time for dreams. For distractions.
For Nate fucking Eriksson. But her body hadn’t gotten the memo, and her heart?
Her heart said let’s risk it all for vibes.
Holly didn’t go home. She walked until the sky turned the color of unresolved feelings and she ended up back at the studio lot. She buzzed herself in, kicked off her sneakers, and padded barefoot across the darkened rehearsal space.
The mirrors caught her like they always did, with a judgmental eye that left her feeling raw. Luckily, she was a performer. She knew how to hold herself like she wasn’t breaking. How to smile and just keep on keepin’ on, dancing like her life depended on it. Because it did.
She flicked on one strip of lights. Just enough to see herself, but not enough to see…
other things she wasn’t ready to deal with.
Her feet whispered against the floor as she ran the Quickstep routine again.
Again. And again. Until sweat dampened her hairline, her chest, her spine.
Until her body trembled not from effort, but from the weight of everything.
She didn’t hear the door open or notice the shift in air pressure until a shadow moved in the corner of her vision. And then a voice, low and rough, close enough to scrape against her spine.
“You’re gonna twist your ankle doing that turn alone.”
Her pulse stuttered like a scratched record. She didn’t stop moving. Wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. “I don’t remember inviting commentary,” she said, breath tight. She’d worked with models. Athletes. Men who looked like sculptures and moved like dreams. But him?
Nate Eriksson was something else entirely.
He was big in a way that short-circuited thought; shoulders like a linebacker, arms carved with ink. His hoodie couldn’t hide the cut of him, long lines and heavy muscle wrapped in lazy posture, every inch radiating leashed aggression.
When he moved? God help her. He didn’t dance like a pro. He danced like a fighter, like his body dared her to keep up. And his eyes? Those cold, glacier-blue eyes saw everything. They didn’t flirt. They unmade.
“I was on my way home,” he said. “Saw the light on.”
“Great.” She spun again, harder this time, like momentum would act like a talisman to ward him off before he caught onto the fact that she was absolutely aching between her thighs. “You can turn it off on your way out.”
But he wasn’t deterred. She could feel him behind her, just watching with that bruiser’s intensity, like he could pin her in place without ever laying a hand. Her next step faltered ever so slightly.
“You okay?” he asked, voice like velvet over a blade.
“Fine.”
Fine, fine, fine. This is fine.
“Just tired,” she lied. “It’s late.”
His gaze dropped deliberately to her mouth, lingered there like it had every right to, then drifted lower.
Unhurried, shameless, before he hauled it back up to meet her eyes again.
Like he was taking inventory. Like he wanted her to know exactly what he was thinking without giving her the satisfaction of saying it.
“You should go home,” he said, voice rough with restraint. “Get some sleep.”
It sounded less like advice and more like a dare.
She ignored him and moved back to their starting position, setting her feet with exaggerated precision, shoulders squared as if the choreography could protect her from everything else. “Again,” she said, already counting in her head.
“You always hide here when you’re upset?” he asked, too casual, like he wasn’t standing there looking at her like he’d memorized every fracture line.
“I’m not upset.”
His expression didn’t change, but his eyes sharpened. “You’re doing quickstep drills at midnight with murder in your eyes,” he drawled. “That’s not well-adjusted behavior.”
She stopped. Only for a second, the smallest hitch in movement that betrayed her. Then she turned, chin lifted, breath tight. “I’m fine.”
“Liar.”
The word cut clean through the air between them, too blunt to argue with, too accurate to ignore. Heat rushed into her face as she whipped toward him fully, lungs working harder than they should have been.
“Go home, Eriksson,” she hissed.
Nate
“In my defense, she told me to do something about it. I’m trying to be more coachable.”
He didn’t. Of course he didn’t. He moved closer instead with a purpose, like he knew the floorplan of her rage and exactly where to step without setting off alarms. Close enough that she could feel the heat of his body and his presence filling the space behind her like weather rolling in. Heavy, inevitable.
“This is about Lars, isn’t it?” he asked quietly.
Her spine snapped straight, dancer-perfect, the control in her posture turning razor sharp. “Excuse me?”
“Lars,” he repeated, and the name didn’t leave his mouth so much as it spat. “He looks at you like he’s waiting for a second shot, and you…” His gaze tracked her like a target. “You bristle. Every time.”
She laughed, sharp and brittle, the sound of someone refusing to bleed where anyone could see. “What? Jealous?”
He didn’t answer. Didn’t deny it. He just kept closing the distance between them like he had all the time in the world, and she was the one running out of minutes.
“You don’t get to psycho-analyze me,” she snapped as she jabbed a finger at her watch to turn the sound system off before planting her hands on her hips. The Quickstep died mid-beat, leaving behind a silence so thick it felt like it had weight.
“I’m not,” he said, voice low. “I’m just saying—”