He sighs. “Because I don’t think you’re like Maggie. I think you feel like you have to be, but I think despite wanting success, you do actually care about who you kick down the ladder on your way up. And—I don’t know—I guess I think about all the opportunities I had that I never really appreciated, and I see in you someone who would’ve killed for it. Maybe even literally.” He pauses.
I narrow my eyes. “One of your jokes?”
He smirks with only the tiniest bit of his face. “I just think you deserve a chance. Like how I wish someone would give me a chance with music.”
“Well, thank you,” I say.
He moves toward the wall and pushes a button. The static trapeze lowers, and I feel like a magnet being pulled toward it.
We spend two hours training, with Vas cemented to the floor, circling below the metal bar and instructing me on so many aspects of my style and form that I almost feel like a beginner again.
He’s firm, blunt, and as serious as ever.
But with every criticism—every suggestion on how to be better—I feel like I’m being pushed in the direction I’ve been so desperate to go in but didn’t know where to start.
When we’re finished for the day and I return to my room for a shower, my muscles are aching, there are fresh bruises on my thighs, and my legs feel like orange marmalade.
And I’m beaming from head to toe.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
When I step into the big top the next morning, Vas is sitting on the bar. He asks if I’ve ever been lifted onto the trapeze before.
I tell him I’ve never done any of this before.
He talks me through what we’re going to do, and the next thing I know, he’s hanging from his knees, his hands locked around my forearms. I do a backward roll and he swings me up until my legs are wrapped around his waist, before pushing upward against my feet until I’m high enough to pull myself onto the bar.
We practice the move, again and again, until our bodies move together like water.
Which isn’t a surprise, because every time he touches my skin, I melt.
Tallahassee, Florida October—Week 10
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
Vivien and Dexi invite me out to dinner with some of the other performers, but as much as I love being a part of their group, I decline.
“My body can’t take it,” I say. “I just want to lie on the bed and not move.”
A few minutes after I close the door, a series of quick knocks sound. When I pull the door back, I see Vas’s distorted image through the screen.
He’s wearing jeans and a black shirt, with his silver dagger necklace hanging from his neck.
I push the screen open. “The rehearsal tent isn’t even set up yet. You can’t possibly be here to tell me we need to rehearse.”
“It’s a different kind of rehearsal,” he says. “We need to talk about choreography, and style. It helps to know these things before I get too invested in a song.” He nods toward his trailer. “Do you have a moment to chat?”
I follow him across the yard, acutely aware we’re about to be alone together. Where he sleeps every night. Which feels very different from being alone in a circus tent.
Vas and Jin’s trailer smells like soap and leather. It’s meticulous in a way that reminds me of Dad’s office. Everything has a home. An order. And even though there’re only two of them in here, Vas has a keyboard and a bunch of recording equipment in the corner that take up a decent amount of floor space.
One of the beds is covered in satin gray sheets with purple and yellow throw pillows, fairy lights, and a smaller blanket with the famous neon Andy Warhol images of Marilyn Monroe.
The other bed is plain navy blue.
“Which one is yours?” I ask.
Vas looks at me for a moment, studying me to figure out if I’m being serious or not. Against everything his broody nature is probably telling him, he relaxes his face. “Very funny.”
I smirk, watching him grab a notebook and pen out of a nearby drawer. We sit at the table, and Vas finds a fresh page and starts jotting down the beginnings of an outline.
“I was thinking we should do something that ties our act in with everyone else’s, which means matching a similar sound to the—um—acquired set list.” Vas pauses. “I’m assuming you’ve listened to it