PANIC CLAWS UP MY THROAT. She’s absolutely frightening when she’s angry. The way her eyebrows furrow, crinkling the skin between them, her bowlike lips turned down into the most disdainful frown. I should leave, I think, but as I turn around to escape out the side exit I came in from—preferably not running—Rosie turns to me, in that golden dress as beautiful as a sun—the same color, I imagine, Amara would have worn on page three hundred forty-seven of The Starless Throne.

My throat tightens, but I force out, “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry—”

“You keep saying that. You know I didn’t release that video. I wouldn’t.”

I wince. “I know. That’s why I’m here. To apologize. I shouldn’t have pushed you away. I should’ve trusted you.”

“Yeah,” she replies, “you should have.”

I stare down at the ground, because I can feel all her classmates looking at me, I can hear them whispering, judging, though that shouldn’t bother me as much as it does. It’s par for the course for my life in LA. But this isn’t LA.

“I’m sorry,” I tell her, “and I know that isn’t going to be enough, but before I leave I just wanted to tell you the truth.” And I take a deep breath. My fingers are shaking. Everything is shaking. “I like to read now because I imagine your voice in every word, and I like how happy you look in that library, and I like how you’re so stubborn, and I like how you make me want to be better, and I like how you don’t give me an inch when I mess up and—”

“Get to the point,” a redhead interrupts impatiently, and the teal-haired person beside them ribs them in the side with a look.

“The point is,” and I swallow the knot in my throat. Why is this so much harder than anything I’ve ever done before? “The point is—I’m here because I want to dance with you. Once. As myself. No masks, no fake accents, no pretenses, but now that I’m here I realize how absolutely entitled that sounds and so I just—I’m an idiot, Rosie. I’m an idiot and I love you, and I’ll understand if you tell me no, and I’ll go away, and I’ll never bother you aga—”

She presses a finger to my lips. Everyone around us begins to whisper. I see her father out of the corner of my eye, watching us carefully. I want to tell her that she is the kind of story I have been looking for, and I want to be a part of it.

So, so badly.

And I’m here, standing in the middle of this dark gymnasium, hoping that she wants me still in hers, too.

She slowly drops her fingers from my mouth, cups my face, and smiles.