Falling for my boyfriend’s Navy brother
Chapter 301
The studio smells like rosin dust and old floor polish, the way it always does when the stakes are high. Music dafts from the sound system in fragments not the whole score yet, just pieces, snippets, enough to keep the nerves humming. I press my palm to the hatre and close my eyes for a second, put ling enough to settle the tremble in my stomach.
I’m already in costume. The soft blue rehearsal set Asher got me for Christmas. It fits like it was sewn over my skin, silver threads gleaming faintly under the overhead lights. Every time I look at it, I still can’t believe it’s mine that he gave it to me.
I glance down at the inside of my left sleeve, where the embroidery lives. I know the words by heart now, but I touch them anyway. A rituul. A reminder,
For when you forget you’re made of steel.
My throat tightens, but not in a bad way. In the kind of way that makes everything feel heavier. Realer.
“Penny.” Madame Loretto’s voice cuts through the air like a whip. “Posture. Chin.”
I snap upright instinctively, neck long, shoulders pulled into place. It’s automatic now. I don’t even get defensive when she says it – because she’s right.
She’s always right.
Luc leans over to whisper, “I swear she’s got a sixth sense for slouching.”
I stifle a laugh, even as my ribs expand on the next breath.
He grins at me, boyish and unbothered in his pale rehearsal tights and rolled–down warmups. “You look ready to destroy someone’s dreams.”
“I feel like I might throw up.”
“Perfect,” he says brightly. “That’s peak performance energy.”
We step onto center. No mirrors today – Madame doesn’t allow them during dressed rehearsals. She says we need to feel it now, not fix it.
And I do. I feel it in every inch of my body. The ache in my ankles, the burn in my calves, the way the bodice hugs my ribs. The sweat already slicking my
spine.
This is it.
The closest I’ve ever come to my dream.
The female lead in the spring gala.
Me.
Not the girl in the wings or the one doing corps work in the shadows. Me. Standing in the light. In the costume Asher gave me. With Luc at my side. With three weeks left until opening night.
The music cues and we rise into position.
My heartbeat syncs to the first soft notes.
1/3
201 pm
Chapter 301
And then I danc
Not as Penny, not as the girl who balances rehearsets and recaps and complicated things for boy who says hat wines former with a th
I’m ber. The girl in the bullet. The dream The earthwat of the story.
Loe lifts me like I weigh noting. We’ve reducersed this does for weeks, bet today it fives smoother, reser
notice the ache in my arches or the swan dicking my back. I only feat the music, the fythan, the motion winding to way for my
We hit every mark
I land the final arabesque with my toes burning and my heart racing, and when I drop into the closing your, the slases that follows is beatering
Madame Loretto claps once.
“That,” she says, “was almost professional”
Luc flops dramatically to the floor beside me. “That’s the nicest thing she’s said to me in four months
B
I laugh – breathless and wild with adrenaline- and lie flat on my back, staring up at the cracked ceiling files.
I’ve never felt more alive,
I’ve never felt more terrified.
Three more weeks.
That’s all I have left to become the version of myself I saw in my head as a kid. The girl who owned the stage. The one who told a story with her body. The
one who didn’t crumble under the pressure.
And yet…
I think I’m her already.
I think I’m becoming her.
Every time I wear this costume. Every time I feel the words inside my sleeve. Every time 1 catch Luc’s eye during rehearsal and he gives me that tiny nod
that says we’ve got this.
The fear’s still there.
But the fear doesn’t win anymore.
Sara Lili is a daring romance writer who turns icy landscapes into scenes of fiery passion. She loves crafting hot love stories while embracing the chill of Iceland’s breathtaking cold.
