But with Alex, I got it.
He touched my hair now, my cheek, running his thumb along my jaw before sliding off the couch and lifting his blond head to face me, kneeling on the floor between my knees. “Can I?” he asked, one finger at the zipper on my shorts, looking shyer than I would have thought possible. “I mean—”
“What, like—?” I blinked as it registered what he was after. “On me?”
Alex grinned at that, like I was being funny on purpose. “Yeah, Dana. On you.”
I hesitated. “Is that gross?” I asked uncertainly. I wasn’t used to feeling inexperienced around him, but it wasn’t anything I knew about, not really. “I mean—”
“It’s not gross.” Alex’s eyes were wide, shaking his head at me. “It’s . . . yeah. I promise it’s not gross.”
I nodded slowly, thinking about it. “If you want,” I said finally.
Alex laughed. “Do you want?”
“I—yeah,” I said. “Okay.”
I wriggled out of my shorts and sat back on the sofa, my heart doing a kicky bit of choreography inside my chest. All the muscles in my thighs were rubber-band tense.
“It’s me,” Alex said after a moment, pressing a kiss against the inside of my knee. “Hey. It’s just me.”
I relaxed some after that—enough to enjoy it a little and, after a few minutes, to enjoy it a lot. I gasped and ran my fingers through his hair, my whole body shaking. The feeling of it rolled over me in waves.
“Um,” I said after, sitting up a little, tugging at Alex’s T-shirt until he looked up at my face. “Okay. Wow.”
Alex laughed. “You like that?” he asked, sounding pleased with himself.
“I—yeah,” I said. “Yeah, I liked it.”
“Good,” he said. “I liked it, too.”
I grabbed Alex’s shoulder and yanked until he crawled up the couch to be next to me, the two of us smashed side by side on the cushions in a flushed, sweaty mess. I pressed my cheek against the flat expanse of his chest, rubbing my nose against the cotton and feeling calm and wrung out and safe somehow, just the two of us, far away from Guy and the coaches and the world outside. The light was changing in the apartment as the sun sank behind the complex—everything getting purpler, shadows appearing where there hadn’t been any before.
I turned my face to look up at him, felt his heart thudding under my hand. “We don’t have to go anywhere yet, do we?” I asked hopefully. “Nobody’s going to catch us?”
Alex shook his head, smoothed my hair down. “We can stay here for a while,” he promised. “We’re good.”
I got back to the apartment that night and found Olivia sitting bolt upright on top of her bed, fully dressed, like she’d been waiting. “Where were you?” she asked, before hello or anything else.
I took a deep breath, but before I could say anything: “Were you with Alex?” she asked.
My heart dropped thirty stories at once. “Olivia,” I said. “I—”
“You were,” she said, eyes narrowing. “I knew it. I knew there was something going on between you guys, Kristin tried to tell me she saw you together—”
“Yeah,” I said honestly. “I was. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry, I want to talk to you about it. I’ve been wanting to talk to you about it—”
“Oh, now you want to talk to me about it, now that I freaking caught you—”
“I’m sorry,” I said again, coming toward her, perching on the edge of her mattress. “It was fucked up of me. It just kind of happened, I never meant to steal him or anything like—”
“Of course you didn’t,” Olivia said, crossing her arms over her chest. “You never mean to steal anything.”
My eyes narrowed. “What does that mean?”
“I don’t even care about Alex anymore. You get that, right? I had a crush on him a million years ago, we’ve talked like three times since I got here, it’s fine. Frankly, I think he’s kind of stupid-looking now. What I care about is that you were too chickenshit to tell me about it.”
“I tried,” I said, struck by the unfairness of it. “I’ve been trying for weeks and weeks to have a conversation with you, but—”
“When?”
“The very first day anything happened, first of all,” I said. “I told you I needed to talk to you and you totally blew me off.”
“Whatever,” Olivia said. “That was one time. We live together. I’m pretty sure you could have carved out two seconds to mention you’re boning my middle-school crush.” She shook her head. “At least I finally understand why you’re still here.”
“I want this just as much as you do,” I said hotly. “Just because my whole life hasn’t been about some regional production of Cinderella that I did when I was twelve, that doesn’t mean—”
Olivia snorted. “Okay, Dana. Do whatever you want, keep on Single White Female–ing me. For your next trick you’ll probably murder me in my bed so you can just take over my life entirely, how about that?”
“Now you’re being ridiculous.”
“That’s what Ash and Kristin think, you know that, right? That you’re obsessed with me?”
“You’re acting insane.” I was crying now, not bothering to try to hide it. “Why is it so hard to believe I might want something for once in my life?”
“It’s not hard at all,” Olivia shot back. “Clearly when you want something, you go right ahead and take it, never mind who it actually belongs to.”
“This doesn’t belong to you!” I shouted. “Alex didn’t belong to you; Daisy Chain doesn’t belong to you! You don’t have blanket ownership over the whole world, Olivia.”
Olivia looked at me with an expression I’d never seen on her face before. “You should have just stayed in Jessell where you belong.”
I felt like she’d slapped me. I wished she’d slap me; I wanted to hit her back, to hurt her as much as I possibly could—to pull hair and leave scratches, to have this out once and for all. Then I wanted to storm out of the bedroom—out of the apartment, out of the complex, out of Orlando entirely—but one, it wasn’t like I had anywhere to go, and two, that was exactly what she wanted, wasn’t it? For me to go back to Jessell with my tail between my legs, to let her take her place in the spotlight? No, I thought spitefully, flouncing onto my bed and raising my eyebrows in a challenge. She could go if she wanted. I was going to stick it out.
Olivia glared at me, shook her head again, and threw herself into her own bed so hard the springs groaned. Both of us lay there, breathing angrily, neither of us getting up to change into pajamas or brush our teeth, refusing to cede even an inch of space to the other. My whole body ached like a bruise.
TWENTY-ONE
Olivia was already gone by the time I woke up the next morning, the comforter on her bed neatly smoothed, pillow plumped and lying against the headboard. If I hadn’t known better, I’d have thought she hadn’t slept in it at all. It annoyed me, how meticulous she was, how tidy. Everything about her annoyed me right now.
I wasn’t late, but the rest of them were already downstairs waiting in the car, sitting three in a row in the backseat like birds on a telephone wire. Olivia didn’t say anything when I opened the door of Charla’s SUV, staring out the window with her arms crossed. Kristin and Ash oozed silent contempt from the backseat. Perfect, I thought, buckling my seat belt with more force than was probably necessary, my stomach twisting unpleasantly as I imagined what she must have told them about our fight and how it had started. Now they could add backstabbing slut to the long list of reasons they hated my guts.
Charla followed me down the steps into the parking lot, hair tightly secured in a long braid over her shoulder and her car keys jingling in her hand. “Everything okay?” she asked, eyes cutting from me to the rest of them.
“Yup,” I said, too loudly. “Everything’s great.”
Guy sat in on our rehearsal again that day, leaning back in a folding chair in the corner and looking at us critically, his arms folded across the bulk of his barrel c
hest. “Okay, ladies,” he said once we were finished with our warm-ups. “Here I am. Better than last time, right? I want you to amaze me.”
I wasn’t feeling much like I could amaze anybody on this particular morning, my black mood like a woolen cape out of a fairy tale, but I took a deep breath and tried to focus. I wanted to let the anger fuel me, to use it as motivation to do better than I ever had before—to prove, once and for all, that I deserved to be here just as much as anyone else did. When I glanced over at Olivia she was scowling in my direction; I rolled my eyes and looked away. Let her think I was only here to steal from her, to take what she saw as rightfully hers. Let them all think whatever they wanted. I’d show everyone the truth.
I closed my eyes briefly as Lucas started us on an up-tempo dance number called “Hey,” the electronic drumbeat coming from his keyboard matching the thump of my own anxious heart. Ashley was the tiniest bit early on her cue, but the rest of us hit our first poses exactly, crouching down and then exploding upward, elbows popping and fingers spread wide.
We looked and sounded way better than we had the last time Guy had watched us, I knew that much was undeniable. The extra rehearsing we’d been doing—that I’d been doing—was paying off. But the tension radiating from us was palpable, like stink lines in a Saturday morning cartoon: when I glanced over at Ashley, her smile had taken on a manic, slightly deranged quality, like she’d been lobotomized. Kristin was straight-up grimacing as she ground her way through the routine. And Olivia’s voice was way louder than usual, her volume making it difficult for me to find the harmonies I’d been working so ridiculously hard on, that by now I could usually hit problem-free. Was she purposely trying to out-sing me? I couldn’t tell for sure.
“Stop,” Guy said suddenly, standing up and waving his hand until Lucas took his fingers off the keyboard; the silence was startling, almost obscene. “Stop, stop, stop.” He looked around the room at us, frowning. “This isn’t working.”
All of us froze where we were for a moment, the color draining out of everyone’s faces. What wasn’t working? I wondered, but none of us dared to say a word. Ash crossed her arms, hugging herself like she was suddenly freezing. Olivia’s lips were a pale, thin line.
“Your whole brand is supposed to be carefree fun,” Guy reminded us. “It’s summertime, school’s out, everybody’s enjoying themselves. The four of you look like you’re having root canals up there. It’s fucking miserable to look at.”
Fucking miserable, seriously? It felt like a balloon had popped inside my chest. All the work I’d been putting in lately, and for what? Here I was, in the same place we’d been weeks ago, never measuring up.
Guy shook his head. “Don’t get me wrong,” he went on, as if he knew what I was thinking. “Technically, you’re better than you were. I can see you’re trying. But it’s a personality thing. The four of you should have gelled by now, and you just haven’t. Quite honestly, you’re boring to watch. Maybe four is the wrong number here, I don’t know.” He rubbed a hand over his face. “Look,” he said, “the thing about these groups is that there’s one star. You get that, right? The Jackson Five had Michael; the Supremes had Diana Ross. All four of you in a line like this, vying for attention—it doesn’t work. It’s hard on the eye.”
Guy was quiet for a moment, his words hanging in the air as if you could reach out and grab them, a handful of broken glass. “So,” he said, looking at each of us in turn, “which one of you is the star?”
That took me aback—took all of us aback, our eyes widening, the question sucking all the air out of the room. Nobody said anything; the four of us looked at one another uneasily. After a moment Guy sighed, impatient. “This isn’t some cute rhetorical exercise, ladies. I’m looking for an answer.”
Silence. Olivia stared at her fingernails. Kristin looked at the ground. Ashley and I caught eyes for a minute, both of us glancing immediately away. Until now we’d been able to keep up the facade that we were all in this together, a team—albeit a messed-up one—working toward a common goal. Asking us to pick among ourselves felt taboo, as if Guy had demanded to know which one of us was ugliest or deserved to be dropped off a bridge. It felt like he was trying to get us to violate some kind of implicit code.
Finally, he shook his head, clearly disgusted. “We’re done for the day,” he said. “I have to figure out what to do with you. Go away.”
“I mean, it’s you, clearly,” Alex said that night. We were sitting face-to-face on the sofa in the apartment he shared with Trevor, knees bent and bare feet brushing. Dinner with Charla and the girls had been a miserable, silent affair, the tension in the kitchen as thick and starchy as the vegetarian chili Charla had made. I’d dashed out the front door as soon as I could, telling myself I didn’t care about the nasty looks the rest of them were undoubtedly shooting me behind my back. “You’re the star.”
I waved my hand like his words could be batted away. “You have to say that.”
“I don’t, actually,” Alex pointed out. He wrapped one big hand around my ankle and tugged until I scooted down closer to him; he pressed his thumb against my bare instep, and I shivered.
“That feels nice.”
“It’s supposed to,” Alex said, running his palm up over my calf and squeezing. “I’m distracting you.”
“You’re not, actually, but I appreciate the effort.” I sighed, but let him kiss me, closing my eyes and tilting my chin up, breathing in his clean boy smell. It occurred to me again that our relationship would probably only last as long as we were in this place together—that if I got cut from Daisy Chain, the odds were that Alex and I would never see each other again. After all, we’d barely known each other a month. It had been an intense month, sure—we’d seen each other every day, and he knew more about me than arguably anyone else on the planet besides Olivia—but still. It scared me, how much I cared about him. It felt dangerous, like I was asking to get hurt.
“What about now?” Alex murmured after a moment, as my knee came up to hug the side of his body. “Am I distracting you now?”
I swallowed hard. “That’s a little better,” I allowed.
Alex smiled against my jawline. “It’s going to be fine,” he promised. “I know it.”
I sat up then, gently pushing him off me. “Can you stop saying that?” I asked. “That everything is going to be fine? I mean, I appreciate that you’re trying to help me, but you have no reason to think that’s true.”
“How talented you are is the reason,” Alex said, frowning. “How much I like watching you when you’re onstage.”
I laughed at that, the edge in my voice betraying a frustration I hadn’t even realized I was feeling. It seemed like nothing ever went wrong for Alex. So of course he had no reason to think anything ever would. “We’re fooling around, Alex! Of course you like looking at me when I’m onstage.”
Alex’s eyes narrowed. “And you said yourself Tulsa basically told you you’re the star of Daisy Chain,” he reminded me. “So don’t throw some false modesty around like—”
“That’s not what he told me,” I countered. “And it’s not false modesty! I don’t get to be sure of myself because one dude gave me a compliment, Alex, even if it was Tulsa MacCreadie. I haven’t spent my entire life being a golden child and having everybody tell me I’m God’s gift to the performing arts.”
Right away, I knew I’d gone too far; Alex looked like I’d slapped him in his face. “Is that what you think of me?” he asked. “That people just hand me stuff and tell me how great I am all day long?”
“No,” I said, “that’s not—” I broke off, shrugged a little. Told the truth. “I think your life is easier than most people’s lives, yes.”
“Okay,” Alex said, standing up. “You know what—”
“It’s true!” I protested. “I’m not saying it as a value judgment, I’m just . . . saying it.”
“You are saying it as a value judgment, actually.”
I huffed a breath out. “I’m s
orry,” I said. “I don’t want to fight.”
Alex made a face. “Don’t you?”
I didn’t know how to answer that. Until now, I’d mostly been able to ignore how different Alex and I were—like the fact that we were here in this bubble together meant it didn’t matter that we came from completely opposite places, had completely opposite experiences of the world. But the thing about bubbles was that, inevitably, they popped. I didn’t know if what we had when we were together was any match for who each of us was on our own.
“I should go,” I told him finally. “You’re right, I’m sorry. I’m tired. I’m being a jerk.”
Alex looked at me, his expression hurt and baffled. I felt my stomach clench. “Okay,” he said. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”
“Okay,” I echoed quietly. I headed out into the twilight toward home.
TWENTY-TWO
“Well, ladies,” Guy said the next morning, sitting behind the desk in his cramped, windowless office, “we tried this. And I’m sorry to say it didn’t work.”
Here it was. I crossed my arms in front of my chest, struggling to keep my gaze steady as I planted my feet far apart and pushed my shoulders back: I wanted to take up space. I’m not afraid of you, I wanted to tell him, although obviously that was a giant lie. Guy held my entire future in his pocket, the same way he’d carry a handkerchief or a pack of gum.
“It wasn’t just that abysmal performance a couple of weeks ago,” Guy continued, “although—make no mistake—it was abysmal. Still, I’ve seen worse. We could have fixed that if the four of you had developed any kind of chemistry as a group. Dance moves we can teach. Voices I can remix. But that special thing, that lightning in a bottle, you all just—you don’t have it.” Guy shook his head. “So in the interest of getting this over with as quickly as possible and not leaving you hanging in suspense, I’m just going to lay it out for you girls. You’re leaving me no choice. I’m disbanding Daisy Chain. Ashley, Kristin,” he said, “you’re out.”
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