“See you.”
I’m proud of myself. I get all the way out to my car before I start to cry. So much for my perfect dream job. Everything about it was an illusion. My best friend is barely speaking to me, and almost everyone I worked with hated me. The only thing that was real was Julian, if that was even real. He said he wanted to be with me outside the club but that never happened. Who knows if he ever really meant it. This is all so fucked up. No wonder Cosette is in this kind of spiral. If she was already jealous and suddenly all of the dancers are saying that I’m the favorite, if everybody was saying that, then her jealousy would have just gotten worse. And even though I never meant for any of this to happen I still feel like a shitty friend.
I scrub at my eyes, trying to get the tears to stop, but they won’t. Screw it. I start the car and head for home. At least at home I know what I can do to make this all go away. I can just do what I used to, curl up with a book or a movie and a tub of ice cream. Probably a movie, because if I pick up one of the books from the growing stack of romance novels on my dresser, all I’m going to do is imagine that it’s me and Julian, and I’m not entirely sure that I want to think about him right now.
There’s a chime from my phone when I pull into my driveway, and I pull it out of my bag as I turn off the car. It’s a text from Julian. My stomach churns.
Are you okay? After last night.
I text back quickly.
I’m fine.
Only a few seconds pass before the phone chimes again.
Are you free to come in early? I’d love to spend some time with you before your shift.
My shift. At the club. Never elsewhere. After everything, I’m finding it all a little too hard to believe. All a little too convenient. What if it was all just a ploy? Fuck the dancer and make her popular so the people in the club admire her. Make her your star so people will keep coming back to see her. Maybe it’s not true, maybe it’s not real, but right now I’m having a hard time figuring out what is and isn’t. I text him.
I won’t be coming in at all. You can speak with Trisha about it.
Then, as an afterthought,
Did you know the whole time that everyone hated me?
A chime even faster than the last one.
What are you talking about?
I don’t answer, pushing out of the car and heading towards the house. Chime.
Libby?
I turn off my phone and drop it in my purse. I don’t want to have to explain it He can talk to Trish about it. She seems to know all the dirty details anyway so it’s probably better if he gets his information from her. I clearly don’t know anything about anyone.
Music is playing when I go inside, coming from Cosette’s room. Up and about then, that’s good. I head down the hallway and pause in the doorway. Cosette is dancing in front of her mirror while she curls her hair. Her make up is partially done, and the way she’s dancing is goofy, but I haven’t seen her this happy in a long time. She’s wearing one of her new club costumes—I was there when she picked it out. A strapless black jumpsuit with giant flared pantalets that make her look long and lean and amplifies every move she makes with her legs by ten.
She catches my eye in the mirror and startles, smiling. “You scared the shit out of me. How long have you been standing there?”
“Not long. A couple minutes.”
Turning towards me, she gives me a long, hard look. “You look like hell. Where have you been?”
I chuckle. I climbed a mountain and had a crying fit, so yeah, I probably don’t look great. “I climbed Lookout Mountain.”
“You haven’t done that in forever. Why now?”
I shrug. “It seemed like a good idea today.”
“You’re crazy,” she mutters. “It’s the middle of summer.”
She finishes her curls and applies the final touches of eyeliner that make her eyes look bigger than life. This is the Cosette I miss, and I have to fight the rising of tears again. “You look beautiful,” I say.
Cosette snorts, nearly messing up her eyeliners. “We both know that—present state aside—you’re the pretty one. Everyone knows that, Libby.”
She makes a face at me, and I know she’s joking, but right now it just hits too close to home. “Yeah, well, from now on they won’t. At least not at the club.”