49. Anastasia
ANASTASIA
Even with the dimmed lights, my position off to the stage’s side leaves my family in view from where they fill the front row.
Serafina chats quietly with Lev, who appears to be ignoring her, but his thumb stroking her knuckles implies otherwise.
Vanessa points out the various venue fixtures to Zeno and Katya, both of whom listen raptly.
Dimitri’s eyes are glazed and unfocused as they stare into the far corner, seemingly lost in thought while his arm remains around the back of Katya’s chair.
More and more of the crowd settles into the auditorium for what was a last-minute addition to the performance lineup.
I honestly couldn’t guess how many attendees would show up with only a month’s warning, but tickets still got snatched within the first week of going on sale—a fact great for my pride and where the proceeds would be headed.
Last month, when accidentally thinking about him, I decided to erase all the positive moments from my mind.
With no performances lined up, my studio practice was exactly that—practice.
It went nowhere, and his presence tainted my latest show.
I needed more, something to occupy my obsessive pre-show tendencies.
So I reached out to Anya, my business manager, and demanded she schedule something. She believed that, with the last-minute nature of my request, selling it to the public would be harder without extra motivation, and proposed a charity show.
The Bratva doesn’t really do charity. It’s practically a swear word in our world, but needing something to fill my mind that isn’t ocean eyes, dark hair, and a grin that tore me apart, I agreed on the premise of choosing the charities, but then left it up to my family.
Vanessa voted for donating to women’s shelters. Serafina wanted animal rescues. Katya proposed looking into underfunded organizations that work with trauma survivors. So the proceeds will be split across the three—something that skyrocketed ticket sales when that news went public.
Anya taps me on my shoulder before sliding a paper into my hands. “Before you begin, I thought you may want to see this. It’s pretty impressive. Good job.”
It’s a printout spreadsheet of profits, except the numbers are higher than should be possible. I’m no Lev, but a brief calculation… “This can’t be right. There’d need to be double the amount of seats sold to bring this in. A miscalculation?”
“Flip it over.”
On the other side, there are two numbers scribbled. One labelled venue sales and the other from an anonymous donor. The two added together equate to the profit amount from the opposite side.
“An hour ago, a call came in asking for you or, to quote, ‘whoever is in charge there’, so they handed it off to me. Some kind soul must feel highly of this cause because they wanted to make a donation, matching whatever the ticket sales brought in. They didn’t even ask for that amount before agreeing.
” She plucks the paper from my hand with a cheery, “Good luck out there,” and disappears down the hall.
I’ve seen some largely funded cheques. Weapons and drugs don’t come cheap for the buyer or seller. But for a ballet show…
“One minute ’til curtain’s up,” one of the stagehands calls from behind me, which means rewiping my hands along the dress, then erasing the number from my mind.
Whoever made the call probably wants a damn good performance, and it’s my job to provide it for them and everyone else—to thank them for their donations and ensure they leave later feeling good about where their money is headed.
When the curtain lifts, the music begins, and my signal is reached, I let myself float away on the cloud that dancing provides.
One where my focus is entirely on each movement, the positions of my muscles, and not on the hands that once held me in my studio, or the face that infiltrates my mind every time my eyes shut.
At the end, the crowd erupts into a thunderous noise, and through it, a piercing whistle reaches me. The lights dim in time for me to catch Serafina’s fingers lowering from her mouth.
The crowd starts filing out, and my family heads to the side exit that’ll take them to the back hallway and later the staff parking lot. I back up, intending to head to my changing room and embed these memories as my latest show, rather than what used to be.
As I turn, a sole form on one of the upper balconies pulls me to a stop. Seated in the chair closest to the stage, they don’t seem bothered by being the only one still sitting. Most of the other guests have lined up to leave.
While it’s not abnormal for one guest to wait until last to evacuate the auditorium, something about this one has me shifting to get a better view.
He’s too far away to make out clearly, but his dark hair, the shape of his face…
something seems too familiar. The guest reminds me of the man appearing in my dreams, even two months later.
Sometimes they’re good, but often they’re nightmares about abandonment.
That’s what feels like happened. I abandoned him by leaving, but he did it first by betraying me.
Nero?
My hand lifts, as though to reach. A roving spotlight scanning the room passes in that exact moment, blinding me.
When it continues and the balcony is clear once more, his back is to me, walking away.
The non-interaction leaves me so rattled that I roughly pluck out the many bobby pins keeping my hair up the second I’m inside my changing room. My lungs constrict, no breath enough to process what I think just happened—who I believe was present.
My steps falter, lungs becoming basically useless when met with the sight of the massive bouquet of roses on my vanity table.
There’s no way.
I should toss them out without even touching them. Should burn them like the deliverer burned my trust.
But I don’t. I walk towards them, scanning for a card but finding none. Nothing to confirm he was here, but he was.
Deep down, I feel it.
The donation Anya showed me flits into my mind. A man with means like Nero would be able to do something like that, but would he? If he believes a donation can make up for what he stole from Lev and me, he has another thing coming.
Suddenly, my rattled heart thanks him for the donation. Because for a moment, at the sight of him on the balcony, I forgot how much his actions hurt me.
My legs crumple under me, and I sit on the bench, staring at the exhausted woman in the reflection. My skin is red from exertion, my hair now a crinkly shape from being in a tight bun before I tore out my bobby pins, the dress showing signs of sweat.
Otherwise, she’s normal. She’s the Elite her family knows. The one everyone’s been waiting nearly two months to witness snap—again. Vanessa and the others have been so cautious not to say the wrong thing, and it’s downright irritatingly supportive.
It’s her expression that rips out my heart, though.
Eyes a bit emptier than they were. For a few good weeks, they were bright with happiness.
A mouth that struggles to smile. Fingers tired from constantly refreshing my phone, seeking another text even though his initial explanation said everything and now it’s up to me to respond.
After our playful messages in the beginning, the weak moments I live through long to see his name flash on my phone with an incoming text.
I pluck a single rose from the bouquet and bring it up to my nose, inhaling deeply. Two months and not a sign from Nero, and this is how he returns? The flowers, his presence, the donation… It’s not the man I punched.
Not the lying version of him. The one who used me. The thief of everything—my papa’s location, my trust, and my hea—I cut the thought off before it takes an undesirable journey.
That version would do all this. He would’ve continued to stay away.
I slip the rose back into the vase and face the mirror again. A wipe of my hand traps the traitorous stray tear sliding down my cheek that I vowed to never have over him after the last time.
None of this matters, anyway. Nero will never earn my forgiveness, no matter how much my heart shatters every time he appears in my thoughts.
“Did Nero fly in with you?”
Zeno glances up from the wine he’s pouring after abruptly bursting into the kitchen.
He scans me, taking in the mussed post-performance hair, the fact I didn’t bother changing my clothes before speeding home, needing to know if I’m insane or not.
After filing the rose back into the vase, I never stood up from the bench, finding my muscles unable to complete all the things I had to, since my mind was continuously on him.
He’s a dick who’s ruining my life, even when I’m trying my darndest to forget him.
“No?” He phrases it with confusion, and the tilt of his head.
“You alright?” Vanessa comes up behind me, entering the kitchen in time to see me officially flip from sane to insane. I must be if I don’t discover the truth behind tonight.
“Fine.” I wave her off without bothering to glance her way. Instead, I practically crawl across the counter to get to Zeno and make him understand why this is so important. “Are you absolutely sure?”
Confusion shifts to a concerned glance towards Vanessa that I pretend not to see. “Ninety percent positive. He’s in Rome, working. Did you…did you want him here?” A strange hopeful expression crosses his face, though it’s quickly masked by a sip of his drink.
My heartbeat slows with the confirmation of my insanity. Of course, Zeno’s telling the truth. Of course, he’d know if his own right-hand man was out of the country and away from work.
“No.” I straighten off the counter, collecting my remaining dignity. “It’s fine. It’s—never mind.”
Before he or Vanessa bothers me with more questions, I escape from the kitchen. When Vanessa asks him to fill her in on what I said before she entered, my steps slow, hesitating to listen to Zeno’s response. Back to the wall beside the doorway, I brace my stomach and stop breathing.
“She was wondering if Nero is in town. I told her he isn’t.”
“Was that the truth?”
See, I’m not crazy. Van’s wondering the possibility too.
“I think so. He’s…well, you know.”
“Still?” Empathy edges Vanessa’s tone.
Still? What’s still?
“Sì. He’s been getting worse, and I…I don’t know how to help.
It’s the worst bender he’s ever been on, to my knowledge.
He’s sober for maybe a couple hours a day—if that.
When I’m here, Elio checks on him, usually discovering him in some sort of mess or the other.
He’s trashed his room so many times, we’ve given up having it cleaned or fixing the damage.
He won’t talk to me. He refuses detox and rehab and even a private damn therapist—anyone actually qualified to help him.
I…” Zeno’s sigh floats from the kitchen and right into my stomach, to the small place where guilt resides
Stupid. This is Nero’s doing. If he wants to drink himself to death over feeling at blame, over what he stole from me—good.
Except this time, the anger isn’t strong enough to push out a disturbing image of Nero passed out in bed, unshaven and probably not showering, alcohol bottles strewn all around.
“That’s why you’ve been going longer between visits?” Vanessa asks, tormenting me further. Or my torment lingers when I don’t budge from the spot and do the wise thing by escaping.
He grunts. “That and the missing shipment that has zero leads, no matter where we look. It’s frustrating, and he’s making my job harder. I’m trying to be there for him, but he doesn’t want me to be.”
“You can’t help someone who doesn’t want it.”
He’s silent for a beat before murmuring, “Would you give up on her if she was acting like that?”
Vanessa’s silent for five rough beats of my heart. I inch closer to the doorway, anticipating—grasping—for her response, curious to know the answer.
“I think I have given up,” she utters in a tone I’ve never heard from her before.
“She’s been different since it happened.
We’re all noticing it. For a while, I thought it was in my head, but Dimitri confirmed my feelings.
Hell, even Lev notices, and you know how he can be sometimes.
She’s…gone. Her spark has been snuffed out.
I miss my friend, but she won’t talk to me either.
She claims she’s fine. Although she’s not drinking herself to death like him, she’s working so much to distract herself that she’s halfway dead. ”
My toes press down into the floorboards to keep me still, to not rush in there and spew a counterargument. She’s wrong. I haven’t been working myself to death. Working every day all day isn’t to death. I’m doing what the organization requires to keep the Bratva at full strength.
I’m not distracting myself.
“The show from tonight didn’t even exist a few weeks ago!” she continues, her voice rising. “You know how difficult it is for her manager to have gotten something that grand out in the world so soon? Once she got the idea for a last-minute performance, she insisted.”
“Did you ever figure out why she wanted one?”
She never even asked.
“No, but I have a strange suspicion it has to do with the man behind her entire mood.”
Wrong.
Correct, my inner voice adjusts my lie.
Zeno sighs again, and not wanting to hear anything further—with my stomach in knots, I slink away to my bedroom.
It takes me until two a.m. to fall asleep. Not because the performance didn’t tire me out, or because I’m restless.
No, it’s due to the phone gripped in my hand, the message I’ve typed and deleted so many times, my eyes are crossing.
Thank you.
If I was brave, I’d click Send. Gratitude doesn’t say forgiveness. It isn’t an opening to talk. It’s simply thanking him for his donation and the flowers.
But the fact he phoned it in anonymously and didn’t include a card with the bouquet says he didn’t want me to know. So I backspace the letters for a final time and make the keyboard disappear, which lowers the previous messages we’ve sent to one another, the latest being his long explanation.
I’ve read it so many times it’s imprinted into my mind. I’ve also taken screenshots of it that I’ve backed up, in case my phone combusts or something.
By 2:15, I toss the phone onto the charger, roll away from it, and put Nero back into the past where things hurt less.