Chapter 54
Fifty-Four
THEN | SISK
Iroll my shoulders back and let the swell of the violins pull me into the opening sequence.
A cascade of precise movements. Count, turn, extend, hold—my body executes the choreography with an autonomy that bypasses thought entirely, the months of relentless repetition having seared the movements into muscle memory until they exist separate from consciousness.
The predawn practices and midnight sessions, the ice packs numbing throbbing joints, the blood staining the inside of my pointe shoes—all of it fades into the background where it belongs.
I drive into the first grand jeté with more force than is strictly required, and I hear a faint, sharp intake of breath from the sea of strangers beyond the lights. A current of grim satisfaction runs through me.
I deepen the cambré beyond the limits of rehearsal, allowing a fractional tremor to linger in my hand before it finds its placement, injecting something visceral and unrefined into the sterile beauty of the piece.
They’ve titled this ballet Ascension, and so I rise into a series of fouetté turns, my world condensing to the single, unwavering point I spot in the blackness.
This is the moment where everything I have ever done either becomes worth it or it doesn’t.
It’s a binary equation: the sum total of my life reduced to this spinning, breathless moment of potential triumph or catastrophic failure.
My knees tremble through the final sequence—not visibly, but I feel the vibration traveling through my bones as I push into one last extension, pulling breath from somewhere deep and bruised within me.
The music crashes to a halt. A moment of profound silence. Then, the applause erupts, a tidal wave of sound that breaks over the stage. I dip into a bow, arrange my features into a smile, and perform the final gestures of gratitude, my body still dancing even after the music has died.
When I straighten, I let my eyes sweep the crowd once. A sea of faces—parents, faculty, donors. Not a single one of them here for me.
I step back as the next dancer takes her place. I disappear into the wings, telling myself the hollow feeling is just exhaustion. I push through the other dancers, past the stage manager’s hushed instructions, the smile plastered on my face until the backstage door clicks shut behind me.
I’m halfway down the hall before I break into a run, making it to the dressing room just as the numbers on my locker start to blur. The first sob catches me by surprise. I slap both hands over my mouth.
The door bangs open. “Sisk!” Marabeth, still in costume with pink cheeks, rushes in. “You were incredible! The panel was literally on the edge of their seats!”
I turn away, but she’s already plopping down next to me.
“Hey—” she laughs softly. “Are you crying?”
I sob harder.
“Post-performance crash. You pour everything out and then it all just hits you.” She squeezes my shoulder. “You’ve been working your ass off for this. You finally let it out. It’s good.”
Right.
“That last turn?” she says. “Perfection.”
I make a noise that’s supposed to be a laugh.
“Come out with us tonight,” she says. “No hiding in your place. We’re celebrating. Rooftop on Mercer?”
I shake my head automatically. “I’m exhausted.”
“Exactly. You deserve it.”
She lowers her voice slightly. “He didn’t come.”
She doesn’t know everything but she knows enough.
I stare down at my pointe shoes. “He wasn’t supposed to,” I say.
She stands. “Eight o’clock,” she repeats. “You’re coming.”
I sit there for another minute, waiting for the shaking to stop.
It doesn’t. So I do what I have always done.
I wipe my face, straighten up, and methodically begin to dismantle the girl everyone was just clapping for.
I start pulling the pins out of my hair, letting the performance fall away strand by strand.
Each one feels like a small defeat, a quiet surrender to the fact that I’ll have to build her all over again tomorrow.
I always thought this was what I wanted—the applause, the spotlight. But now I get it. All these eyes on me don’t mean a thing, not when the only person who ever actually saw me isn’t here to share it with.
* * *
The restaurant is all glass, floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking a river that runs beside it like a quiet ribbon of silver, nothing like the thick black water back home.
There are no rusted railings here, no flickering streetlights, no stench of oil in the air, just soft music and low conversation.
We take up half a long table near the windows and someone orders champagne before I can object, the cork popping as everyone cheers like we’ve just won something.
We haven’t. The Midseason Showcase isn’t a competition.
It’s just a chance to spend months preparing a piece, perform it for faculty, donors, and visiting directors, then wait for a panel of experts to tell you everything they think you did wrong.
Marabeth throws an arm around my shoulders. “To Sisk,” she declares. “For terrifying everyone tonight.”
This place still feels like a borrowed coat that fits but I know isn’t mine to keep.
Across the table, laughter rises easily with stories about rehearsal mishaps—someone nearly falling out of a lift, someone’s pointe shoe snapping mid-variation.
They bring up summer intensives across the world and a faculty member who might be recommending two of us for a winter company audition.
It all sounds so normal, so possible, so positive, and I realize that back home, ambition sounded like survival but here, it sounds like travel plans.
A server refills my glass without being asked, and I notice that nobody is looking over their shoulder, a habit I didn’t realize I’d picked up so much back home.
Lucas slides into the empty seat beside me, smelling like expensive cologne, his blazer folded neatly over the back of his chair, his hair still damp from a shower.
“You were incredible,” he says quietly, not loud enough for the others to hear.
“Thank you.”
“I mean it. That last section? I couldn't stop watching.”
I shrug. “It’s supposed to look intense.”
He smiles slightly. “Not that kind of intense.”
I look down at my glass.
The river outside moves calmly under the bridge as boats drift past. Sometimes I even forget Tar City exists, that is until I close my eyes. There, I still see black tar bubbling, still hear the wind in The Cut.
Lucas leans closer. “We’re going down to the water after this. A few of us, you should come.”
I almost say no. I’ve said no for months. He’s been patient about it, always asking, never pushing. I don’t want him, but tonight I need someone to keep me upright, so I nod. “Okay.”
He smiles, surprised, and I force a small smile back. This is what normal looks like. This is what leaving was supposed to give me: a clean world, a quiet and safe future. So why does it feel like I’m burying myself alive?
Lucas pays, like he always does, not in a showy way, just steady with a card down and a small nod to the server.
I let him. I don’t feel guilty about it; every bit of money I don’t spend is money I can send home. And the chance that Millie has to take on extra work for those scums she continues to deal with gets smaller.
The scholarship covers my tuition, sure, but it doesn’t cover my family.
It doesn’t cover the stack of medical bills that keep coming.
That’s what’s really been pushing me, the engine under all the numbness.
My life might feel like a blank canvas, but my family needs this.
They need me to succeed here, even if it feels like I’m disappearing.
We cross the street toward the café terrace lining the water, where small round tables sit under strings of lights overhead. A live band is set up near the railing. It’s the kind of place people fall in love on purpose.
Someone passes selling flowers and Lucas waves him over.
“You don’t have to—” I start.
He’s already pulling bills from his wallet. He buys a yellow one and tucks it gently behind my ear.
“There,” he says softly.
I smile, but I’m fighting the urge to cringe. Girls are supposed to love this kind of thing, right? What the hell is wrong with me?
The music slows down, the singer’s voice getting all low and smooth. Lucas stands up and holds out his hand. “Do you have one more dance in you tonight?”
My calves are screaming, my toes are raw, and my body feels like it’s been put through a wringer, but this isn’t the stage, so I take his hand.
We move to the small open space near the band. Lucas puts a hand on my waist, the other in mine. His touch is careful, respectful. He doesn’t pull me in, he waits and I close the distance myself.
It’s all so… nice. The kind of moment that’s supposed to make a girl’s heart flutter.
All I feel is a sick, tired annoyance, but I force myself to like it.
This is what I should want, not rooftops and dirty alleys.
Not rough hands and stolen kisses. This.
Niceness. I push my hips a little closer and make myself dance.
I look up at him, and he leans in slowly, his lips brushing mine. They're soft and warm, but there's absolutely no fire, no shock, no feeling of falling. An ordinary kiss. A kiss that makes sense and bores me to tears. I let myself imagine what life would feel like if this was enough.
When I open my eyes, I blink, making sure I’m not losing my mind, because across the terrace, near the edge of the river, he’s there—Jax, standing in the dark watching me.
The band plays on and Lucas’s hand is still on my waist, but everything inside me goes wild because Jax is already turning, already walking away.
“I’m sorry,” I breathe, and Lucas pulls back. “What?”
“Gotta go.”
I slip out of his hold, kick off my heels, and run barefoot.
“Sisk—“ Lucas calls out, but I don’t stop.
I push through tables, dodging startled glances, running past the edge of the lights and into the long, dark stretch of sidewalk near the parking garage.
“Jax!” I shout, but he doesn’t stop. Pure rage flares inside me. “Don’t you dare walk away from me!” I scream, but then my right foot comes down on something sharp and I gasp, stumbling hard. “Shit—”
I take another step and hiss, “Shit, shit, pitfire,” catching myself against the wall. I don’t know what makes him turn, but immediately he’s there.
“You’re bleeding,” he says.
“I’m fine,” I grit out, trying to put my foot down and refusing to wince.
He’s already kneeling, his hand closing around my ankle.
“What are you doing?” I snap, trying to pull my leg away.
He doesn’t look up at me. “Stop. Moving.” He lifts my foot. “There’s glass,” he says.
“Glass?”
“You ran barefoot.” It’s an accusation.
“You walked away.” I throw it back at him.
He brushes his thumb over the sole of my foot and I flinch, hating myself for it.
“Hold still.”
“Jax—”
“Hold. Still.”
The command in his voice shuts me down. He pulls a shard out with two fingers, a thin line of blood welling up behind it. It shouldn’t feel this intimate.
“You don’t get to show up out of nowhere and then act like you care,” I say, my breath coming in ragged bursts. “You don’t get to disappear for months and then just—”
He presses his hand more firmly against my heel to stop the bleeding.
“You need to be more careful,” he says quietly, his eyes locking on mine.
“What?” I’m completely thrown.
“With your feet.”
I try to put weight on it, but he’s faster. In one smooth motion, he slides an arm under my knees and lifts me with ease.
“Put me down!” I snap immediately, pushing at his chest.
He doesn’t even slow down. “No.”
“I can walk.”
“No, you can’t.”
“Jax—”
My eyes scan him, taking in the changes.
His shoulders are broader, solid with muscle.
The easy lean of the boy I knew is gone.
His jaw is framed by a short, dark beard.
His hair is longer, falling into his eyes, and there’s a faint scar near his eyebrow that I don’t recognize. It’s all wrong, and it’s all him.
“Where are you going?” I demand, my voice a little too high.
“Where do you want me to take you?”
“Well—” I push against him again, more out of pride than strength. “I guess back to my friends. My date.”
He lets out a low breath that’s definitely a laugh. “We both know you don’t want that.”
“Is that so?” I bite out. “And what makes you so sure?”
He keeps walking, his steps sure and even. “That kiss,” he says, his voice against my ear. “It was like watching paint dry. Painful.”
A burning heat crawls up my neck. “No, it wasn’t.”
He lets out a low, dark chuckle. “Liar. You were so bored I could feel it from across the water.”
I try to squirm, but his grip is like iron. He shifts me in his arms, and the movement presses me closer. “So, what’s the verdict on ‘Sir-Kisses-A-Lot’ back there? Does he have any idea you’re a feral little thing that’ll bite his hand off, or does he think he’s just petting a sweet little bunny?”
“Fuck you, Jax.”
“That’s my rabbit.”
“Thought you were leaving,” I spit out, trying to ignore the way my body is reacting to him.
“I am. Oh, by the way, you were incredible tonight.”
I inhale. “You were there?”
“Wouldn’t miss it.”
What?
“Are you going to tell me where to take you, or should I keep walking aimlessly until you decide?”
I hesitate, caught between my pride and the throbbing in my foot. “Doesn’t seem to be much of a workout for you,” I manage. “All this muscle. Your new life in The Cut must be treating you well.”
He stops. “You know about that?”
I don’t look at him. “Doesn’t matter. Two blocks that way.”
He moves again, and all I can do is try not to breathe in the smell of cigarettes coming off him, all while swallowing the nerve to ask what the hell he did with the Jax I used to know and since when does he fucking smoke.