Archive of Our Own

Keyleth prods fruitlessly at the screen of her iPod and holds the power button down again, even though she’s worked out by now that it isn’t going to do any good. “Fuck,” she says, and then, because she can, “Fucking fuck-all fuck.” She subscribes to the general belief that you save swears for when you really need them, so it feels satisfyingly violent, even if it doesn’t help with the fact that her life’s been ruined.

She’s clearly been spending too much time with Percy, because she can just imagine him raising his eyebrows and saying, That seems a little dramatic, don’t you think?

“Ruined,” she repeats out loud, just to show imaginary-Percy.

“Uh,” a voice says. “What’s ruined?”

She spins around and somehow manages to lose her balance, despite currently being in a profession that relies entirely on keeping her balance while doing a variety of improbable feats, and she lands solidly on her ass, looking up at a guy standing awkwardly in the doorway and staring at her like she’s the biggest doofus in the entire world. Which feels pretty fair right about now.

“Are you…okay?” he says, after a long moment of them just staring at each other.

“What? Yes!” she says, scrambling to her feet and doing a quick catalog to make sure she hasn’t somehow managed to injure herself falling over. That would be a hell of an end to her career—sprained ankle by way of being a loser. Her father would probably never stop knowing he told he so, even if he’d be perfectly supportive and sympathetic. “I’m fine!” she squeaks out, and she blushes. “I’m fine,” she repeats, trying again, but she over-corrects, and it comes out comically low.

“Uh, yeah, okay,” the guy says. “Sure.”

She can feel herself going vibrantly red, like every pale redhead in the world does at the slightest provocation. “So!” she says, trying to brazen through it. “Did you need something? Oh—did you want the room? I actually reserved it for another couple hours.” Not that she’s going to be able to get much done.

He gives her a funny look. “Uh, no. I was just walking down the hall, and I heard you yelling, and I thought maybe you were, um. Dying? That happens to dancers.”

“I wasn’t yelling,” she says, and he snorts. “Okay, I might’ve been yelling. But I’m not. Dying, that is. So you don’t have to worry. About my death.”

“Great,” he says. “I’ll...do that. Not do that. Whatever.” They stare at each other in apparently mutual social disaster, and he makes an odd, jerking motion with his hand. “I’ll just go. Since you’re not dying.”

“I’m not,” she confirms uselessly, and then she continues for absolutely no reason except that she apparently can’t make herself shut up. “My iPod is. Did! That, I mean, with the dying and the—the dying. It’s not working, is what I’m saying, so my life’s ruined. I mean, not ruined, just...” She thinks about it. “It might be ruined.”

He’s staring at her blankly, and she blushes even harder. “Not that you care,” she says quickly. “Not that I’m implying that you don’t care, but you shouldn’t. Probably don’t. Because there’s no reason to care, and I’m sorry, this isn’t your problem, and you were just being nice and making sure I was okay, and I am, so that’s that.”

He opens and closes his mouth several times and then clears his throat awkwardly. “It kind of seems like maybe you’re not?”

“I am, though,” she says, determined to behave like a reasonable person for once. “It’s just...a problem. In my life. But it’s fine.”

He looks around the room. “Were you practicing the solo?”

She gapes at him. “What?”

“The solo,” he says. “Your solo, in...” He frowns at her. “You have literally no idea who I am, do you.”

“Oh, god,” she says, horrified. She stares at him, trying desperately to come up with a name, or even a memory of seeing him. All she can think of is that he’s definitely not built like a dancer, which means he can’t be in the corps de ballet, which makes this not literally the worst thing that’s ever happened to her, but it’s still close. “Oh, god, I’m so sorry.”

“Whatever,” he says, his mouth twisting to the side. “We’ve only ever actually spoken once before.”

She feels even worse, knowing they’ve even had a conversation. “I’m so sorry. Are you—do you work for the company?”

“Yeah,” he says flatly. “I’m in the pit.”

“Oh,” she says, desperately wishing that made him look any more familiar. “Yes, of course.”

He rolls his eyes. “Don’t pretend you recognize me,” he says. “I play cello. We don’t get much a view for actually seeing any dancing, but we still know what you guys are doing. I’ve noticed you in rehearsals and shit, because you talk a lot, and it’s annoying.” His gaze skitters away from her face, his lips pressing together. “Uh.”

“Right,” she says, feeling miserable and awkward and like a terrible person. “That makes sense. Listen, I can’t practice much without music anyway, so I’ll just be going. Did you want the room?”

“It’s a dance practice room. It’s way too big for a single musician to use it.”

“Right,” she says again, tossing her useless iPod into her bag and more carefully storing her speakers. “Well. I won’t bother you anymore.” She yanks her slippers off her feet and haphazardly shoves on her socks and sneakers, pulling on a sweatshirt and smiling at him as brightly as she can. “Nice to see you again. Thanks for coming to check on me.”

She moves past him into the hallway, and then he says, “Wait.”

She turns around, fixing a stage smile to her face, and he winces.

“Don’t do that, it’s creepy,” he says. He chews his lip. “So, you need the music. Uh, for your solo? You never said.”

“Yes,” she says, trying not to be too irritated with him for keeping her here and making her feel awkward and seeing her life crash and burn. “For my solo.”

“Yeah,” he says. “Uh, okay.”

“Okay what?” she says, impatient and a little sick of him.

He grabs his cello from the side of the door, just out into the hallway, and wheels it inside, sticking it on the side of the practice room against the wall. He shucks his shoes, dumping them next to it, and walks across the floor to the piano she’d barely even noticed, except as an obstacle to dance around.

“What are you doing?” she says, staring at him.

“Fuck if I know,” he says, playing a quick couple scales, his fingers flying over the keys. “Okay, mostly in tune, that’s something.” He looks up at her. “Come on, get in here.”

She takes a step forward, but pauses at the door. “Why?”

“I mean, this is going to be rough, because I’ve never tried to play it on piano before,” he says, picking out a tune. After a confused moment, she realizes, shocked, that it’s her solo music. “And cellists never get the melody anyway. But I think I can figure it out.” He shrugs. “I’ve always been good at playing by ear.”

“You’re going to play my music for me?” she says. “You realize I usually practice for hours, right?”

“I’m a musician, I get practicing,” he says. He raises an eyebrow. “Are you coming, or what?”

She drops her bag on the ground inside the room and scrambles to take her sneakers off and get her ballet slippers on again. “I’m coming,” she says quickly. “I’m—thank you, I don’t even know what to say—”

 “Yeah, no, don’t do that,” he says. “The thanking me thing. It’s fine, it’s whatever, you dance, I’ll play music, we’ll both get to practice, it’ll be great.”

She glances at the cello that she’s absolutely certain he plays in the pit instead of the piano, but doesn’t mention it, hopping to her feet and doing a couple of quick stretches.

“Do you need to warm up?” he says.

“No, it’s okay, I did before my I realized my iPod died horrifically,” she says.

“Okay,” he says. “From the top? Let me know if you need to work specific bits.”

“Okay,” she says, and then, because she can’t help it, “thank you.”

He makes a face. “Yeah, uh, whatever. Here we go.”

—

Keyleth gets off the bus and shivers, pulling her hat down firmly over her ears and then stuffing her hands into her pockets. She hefts her bag onto her shoulder and walks quickly, keeping her head down, glad that—for all its many faults—home isn’t that far from the bus stop. It’s cold, and she’s wearing sweats and a leotard and not much else.

She takes the steps up to the door two at a time, fumbling in her bag for her key and practically slamming the door behind her once she gets it open. It’s still cold in the awkward vestibule area, but not as bad, and she takes a little more time unlocking the second door, since it always has a tendency to jam if she shoves the key in too fast.

She hears a crash from upstairs and jumps, glancing up the stairs to the second floor of the house, where she can hear raucous laughter from their neighbors, and grins. She isn’t sure what Grog, Scanlan, and Pike do for fun, but whatever it is, they always seem to be having a good time.

Opening the door to the first floor of the house, her apartment, she’s immediately greeted with the sight of Vex throwing herself backwards off the couch, landing neatly in her brother’s waiting arms as they both laugh.

“Keyleth!” Vex cries. “You’re home!”

“Hi,” Keyleth says, smiling at both of them. “You’re in good moods.”

“Kiki, tell my sister she’s wrong,” Vax says, dumping Vex onto the ground.

“Brother!”

“Uh,” Keyleth says, laughing. “That seems…unfair? What’s she wrong about?”

“I’m not wrong,” Vex says. “All I said was that I would make a much better delicate blushing maiden than he’s going to.”

“I think I’m a perfect delicate, blushing maiden,” Vax says, throwing himself down onto the couch. “I’m very delicate. More delicate than her, anyway.”

“You’re ballet dancers, neither of you is delicate,” Keyleth says, hanging up her coat and pushing her shoes off her feet.

Vex claps a hand to her chest in exaggerated shock. “Take that back! I am the most delicate.”

“You’re about as delicate as a hand grenade,” Vax says. “You’re just jealous because I get the title role for once.”

“For once?” Vex says. “What for once? The last thing we did was the goddamn Nutcracker, and guess who you were.”

Keyleth shakes her head, smiling, and leaves them to it, walking through the room to their tiny kitchen, where Percy is frowning intently into the fridge.

“Hey,” she says, leaning against the counter.

“Hey,” he says absently. “Do we own things that aren’t chicken?”

“It’s good for protein and carb loading,” she says. “And I think Scanlan is friends with some chicken farmer, he keeps bringing us stuff.”

“I’m just saying, would it kill us to buy, like, pork? There are other meats in the world.”

She snorts. “If you’re not eating, move. I’m starving.”

“Of course you are,” he says, taking a few steps to the side so that she can look into their chicken-filled fridge. “This is why I shouldn’t live with athletes.”

“Artists,” she says absently, pulling out some ancient noodles, leftover alfredo sauce from a night when she actually had enough time to use the stove, and, of course, chicken.

“Artists that could bench press me,” he says.

“No, that’s Grog,” she says.

“Of course, how could I forget.” She hears him rummaging around in the pantry and looks up dumping things in a bowl in time to see him pull a package of Oreos out and start eating.

“That’s a healthy dinner,” she says.

“I’m going on chicken-strike,” he says. “No more chicken until someone in this house buys a goddamn sausage.”

“Fine, more chicken for us,” she says cheerfully, sticking her food in the microwave to warm up. She turns around, leaning with her hands on the counter and looks at him, calmly munching on Oreos. “The weirdest thing happened to me today.”

He raises an eyebrow. “Oh? The weirdest? We’re friends with Scanlan, so that’s a high bar to clear.”

She laughs. “Okay, maybe not the weirdest. But weird. I was in a practice room, and my iPod completely died—”

“Oh, no,” he says. “In a permanent way?”

She bites her lip, the sick feeling of anxiety building in her stomach again. “I think probably,” she says. “Can you look at it for me?”

“Sure,” he says. “Though Apple bullshit is always something of a disaster.”

“Anything you can do,” she says with feeling. “But anyway, that wasn’t the weird thing.”

“With an iPod as old as yours, it really couldn’t be,” he says, pulling an Oreo apart and licking at the cream filling. “What happened?”

“I was cursing at it, and this guy came in to make sure I was okay, and then it turned out he was in the pit orchestra, and then he told me I was annoying, and then he played my solo music on the piano for two hours so I could practice.”

Percy chokes. “Dear lord,” he says. “Really?”

“Yes!” she says. “That’s weird, right?”

“That’s weird,” he says. “Who in the orchestra? Anyone we know?”

The microwave beeps and she turns to get her food. “I didn’t even recognize him, which was horrible,” she says. “But it’s not like it was Scanlan or Grog or Pike.”

“No, if one of them said you were annoying and played the piano for you, that would be a lot less weird,” Percy says. “Well. Actually, it might be. I don’t think Grog or Pike play piano. What was his name?”

Keyleth drops her fork into her bowl with a clatter, whirling around to stare at Percy, horrified. “Oh, god.”

“You forgot to ask his name,” Percy says dryly.

“He played the piano for me for two hours, and I forgot to ask his name,” she says. “How does that even happen?”

“There, there,” Percy says. “It could be worse.”

“How could it be worse? First I didn’t recognize him, and then I forgot to even ask him what his name was!”

“Well, did you thank him?”

Keyleth glares at him. “Of course!”

“See? It could be worse.”

“Ugh,” Keyleth says, putting her head in her hands. “I’m an awful person.”

“No, no, come on,” Percy says, coming over to put an arm around her shoulders. “You’re not that bad. Just think. You could be Scanlan.”

She laughs weakly. “That’s true, that would be worse.”

“See?” He pats her back. “Get your food and show me your iPod. I’ll take a look, see if it’s salvageable. We can figure out more about your mystery pianist later.”

“Okay,” she says. “If you can fix it, I’ll marry you.”

“A dream come true,” he tells her solemnly, and she laughs again, kissing him on the cheek as they leave the kitchen.

—

Rehearsal the next day is a nightmare, predictably, but Keyleth isn’t sure what anyone expected from a genderbent version of Giselle, of all things. Vex and Vax are as perfectly in sync as ever, creepily compelling as star-crossed lovers even though she knows they’re siblings, but even they don’t get out of the rehearsal unscathed, since apparently Quall can’t decide on choreography for more than a few minutes at a time.

They never even get to her solo—or any part of the second act—and by the time Quall lets them go, every part of her body is aching, she has a cramp in her leg, one of her toes feels slightly numb, and all she really wants is to collapse onto a bed and watch Netflix until she passes out.

Instead, she cleans up and grabs her things and says, “Hey, Vex?”

Vex looks up from where she’s stretching out one of her legs, kneading her thigh muscle ruefully while her brother leans against the wall with his eyes closed. “Yes?” she says. “What is it?”

“You have a friend in the orchestra, right?” Keyleth says.

Vex raises her eyebrows. “Yes, Keyleth, dear, our upstairs neighbors.”

Keyleth blushes. “No, I meant—other than that. I thought maybe you just knew more people in the orchestra than me?”

“I know one other person in the orchestra,” Vex says dryly. “I’m not exactly flush with contacts.”

Vax opens his eyes. “Flush with contacts? Who says that? Why did you say that?”

“Didn’t you say you were too exhausted and dead inside to ever speak to anyone ever again?” Vex retorts. “Dead or making fun of me, pick one and stick with it.”

Keyleth breaks in before Vax can respond, knowing from long experience that once the twins get started, they basically never stop. “I want to find someone in the orchestra,” she says loudly. “I was hoping you could help.”

Vex pulls out her phone and checks the time. “Actually, I think they get done right about now, same as us. We could go over there, if you like. Find Grog, Scanlan, Pike, my friend Zahra, your mystery person. Who is your mystery person?”

“It’s kind of a long story?” Keyleth says, but it comes out high pitched and wavery.

Vax eyes her. “Well, I was going to go home and nap and leave you guys to it, but now that you’ve said that, I think I’ll come.”

“It’s really nothing,” Keyleth tries.

“Nope, you suck at lying, we’re doing this now,” Vex says, hopping to her feet and giving her brother a hand up.

“I can really go to the orchestra room by myself,” Keyleth says weakly, but the twins are already grabbing their things and walking towards the door, and she has no choice but to follow in their wake.

“Why do you even know when the orchestra finishes rehearsing?” Vax is saying.

“I have friends, brother,” Vex says. “I know this might be a shocking idea for you, but I listen when they talk.”

“I have friends in the orchestra too.”

“Yeah, but do you listen to them when they talk?”

“Well, I listen to Pike.”

“Guys,” Keyleth says. They both look at her, and she says, “I didn’t know when the orchestra rehearses either, Vex.” Though apparently she knows absolutely nothing about the orchestra anyway, despite having three friends in it and it being about the size of a garage band, since she can’t even pick a cellist out of a lineup.

“I think that just proves I’m morally superior to both of you,” Vex says musingly.

“In your dreams, stubby,” Vax says.

Keyleth sighs and lets them snipe at each other, wishing she’d thought to text Percy and make him come along. She sometimes thinks it was a mistake to let Vex and Vax learn to dance with each other, for all they’re almost excruciatingly beautiful and far too good for this tiny dance company in the middle of nowhere. But it means their professional lives hinge on them being wrapped up in their own world, and it has a tendency to bleed over, leaving her on her own.

“Orchestra room,” Vex says at last, gesturing to a pair of heavy looking doors. “Voila.”

“I knew where it was,” Keyleth says, stopping in front of them. “I just wanted to find one person, not the entire orchestra.”

“But the one person is in the orchestra, right?” Vex says. “So I’ve found him for you.”

“I could’ve done that!” Keyleth says.

“Which really begs the question of why you asked my sister for help at all,” Vax says. “I feel like you should’ve know that was a bad idea.”

Vex elbows him. “Shut up, you.” She pulls out her phone, saying to Keyleth, “Here, I’ll text Zahra and find out if they’re done and we can go in, all right? Is that helpful?”

“She could’ve texted the same thing to Pike,” Vax says, which saves Keyleth from having to point that out, but also is only liable to piss Vex off.

Sure enough, she glares at him and says, “I’m calling Zahra and telling her that I need help hiding a body.”

“What did I ever do to you?”

“I’ll write you a list.” She holds the phone up to her ear, and after a second, she says, “Zahra, darling! I’m guessing since you picked up, you aren’t still in rehearsal.” She laughs. “Actually, darling, I’m right outside. My friend Keyleth—have you ever met Keyleth? Oh, well, she’s lovely, you’ll like her, and anyway, apparently she’s looking for someone in the orchestra, is it all right if we duck inside and say hello? Oh, also I’m planning a murder. Vax, of course. All right. Mm-hmm. Okay.” She hangs up and smiles at both of them. “Well? Let’s go.”

Then she grabs Keyleth’s hand and drags her straight through the doors, Vax following behind and laughing at both of them as Keyleth yelps in surprise.

“I want you to meet Zahra first,” Vex says. “And then we can find your mysterious whoever.”

“Um, okay,” Keyleth starts to say, and then she looks up and realizes that the corner of the room where Vex is dragging her, unerringly, is filled with a very familiar looking man packing up a very familiar looking cello case.

“Zahra,” Vex says, coming to a stop right in front of him, and the man looks up, looking startled, and his eyes meet Keyleth’s and widen.

“Vex’ahlia,” someone says, and for a moment, Keyleth feels dizzy, wondering how he’s managing to speak without his lips moving, and then she realizes that it isn’t him talking at all.

“Hello, darling,” Vex says, dropping Keyleth’s hand and leaning forward to kiss the cheeks of a tall, dark-skinned woman with shockingly white hair.

“I’m surprised to see you today,” the woman who must be Zahra says. “I thought you were headed home to sleep.”

“I was, but then Keyleth said she needed to find someone in the orchestra,” Vex says, and Keyleth can’t help her gaze snapping over to the man again, only to find that he’s staring straight back at her.

“Keyleth, of course,” Zahra says. “It’s lovely to finally meet you.”

Keyleth looks over at her, blinking. “Finally?”

Zahra smirks oddly. “Well, I’ve heard so much about you,” she says. The man clears his throat, and she adds smoothly, “From Vex, of course. About all her roommates, though Vax, of course, I’ve met.”

“Oh, well, that’s nice!” Keyleth says. “If you’ve heard, um, good things, that is.”

“The very best,” Zahra assures her.

“Well, it’s really nice to meet you too,” Keyleth says. “Any friend of Vex’s!” And she laughs, in a terrible, uncomfortable way, rounding this off nicely as a horribly awkward, godawful social interaction, just like always.

“That’s sweet of you,” Zahra says smoothly. “Who were looking for in the orchestra?”

“Um,” Keyleth says, glancing down at the man still sitting at the feet. “Your friend, actually.”

He gets to his feet slowly, frowning at her. “Hey,” he says.

“Hi! Um, I wanted to say thank you, again, for—”

“You don’t have to,” he says quickly. “Really.”

“I wanted to, though?” she says, confused.

“What’ve you done that Keyleth needs to thank you for?” Zahra says, crossing her arms and leaning against the wall, eyebrows raised as she looks at her friend. “You didn’t tell me anything about that.”

“It wasn’t a big deal,” he says. “It doesn’t matter, okay? Not a thing.”

“Really,” Zahra says. “How interesting.”

“W-well,” Keyleth says, biting her lip, “I also realized that I, uh, didn’t actually get your name?”

He stares at her. “Oh. Yeah. Okay. I’m Kashaw. Kash.”

“Kash,” she says. “It’s nice to meet you.”

“Yeah, we already met,” he says.

“No, I know, I just meant—”

“Whatever,” he says, looking away and closing his eyes briefly. “Did you get your iPod fixed?”

She looks down. “No. My friend Percy, he tried, but—”

“That, uh, that sucks.” He kind of actually sounds like he means it. “Can you, you know, get a new one?”

“Maybe in another couple of paychecks, if nothing else breaks while I’m waiting,” she says, sighing. “But it’s not like this place is big or famous enough to pay that well.”

“You’re telling me,” he says, and she smiles ruefully at him.

“Kiki, your iPod broke?” Vax says, and she glances over to see him frowning at her.

“Oh, yeah,” she says. “Completely died. Percy says it’s unsalvageable.”

“That’s terrible!” Vex says. “You hate practicing without music.”

“Yeah,” Keyleth says. Ever since she was a kid, rehearsing without accompaniment has felt empty and dead. She has trouble remembering the steps, everything feels off-beat even when it isn’t, and as much as she loves ballet, there’s something lifeless about doing it when there’s no music painting the backdrop. “I’m going to suck, I’m never going to get a job with a better company, and my life’s going to be garbage.”

“That is not true,” Vex says firmly, which is sweet, but unhelpful.

“That’s why you said your life was ruined,” Kash says.

“Oh, yeah,” Keyleth says. “I mean, I was exaggerating. Well, I kind of wasn’t, but I was, you know?”

“Sure,” he says. “Listen, do you—I was just thinking—that is, I could probably use some more practice playing the piano. If you wanted.”

It takes her a minute to work out what he’s very awkwardly trying to offer her, and when she does, her jaw actually drops. “Oh, no!” she says, waving her hands in front of her like she’s trying to physically ward him off. “I can’t make you do that, that would be completely ridiculous! You don’t have to do that!”

“Yeah, I definitely didn’t think I had to,” he says. “But I could, probably. But whatever, if you don’t want me to, you know, that’s fine.”

“It’s not that I don’t want you to,” Keyleth says. “But—”

“Okay, so, give me your schedule,” he says. “If you want me to.”

“Here’s her phone,” Vax says from next to her, holding it out to Kash. “I think she keeps a calendar.”

Keyleth jumps. “That was in my pocket.”

“So?” Vax says, grinning at her.

“That’s very creepy of you,” Kash says, but he takes the phone. After a moment, he says, “It’s locked, though.” He hands it back to Keyleth. “It’s not like I’m trying to force you, or anything, but I, uh. I don’t play piano much. And I like it. So.”

Zahra snorts, but when they all look at her, she just waves a hand and says, “Oh, don’t mind me. I was just thinking of a…cat video I saw the other day.”

Kash’s scowl, if possible, intensifies, and Keyleth wonders what on earth his problem with cats is. “God, Z,” he says. “Shut up.”

“No need for that kind of language,” she says. “Keyleth, dear, what Kash is trying to say is that he wants to help you because he’s secretly a good person.”

“That’s not what I’m saying,” Kash says.

“It’s definitely what he’s saying,” Zahra says.

“Really?” Keyleth says. “Well…”

“He likes to pretend to be tough and mean, but really he’s a softy,” Zahra says cheerfully.

“Z, I’ll kill you,” Kash says.

“Shh, darling, I’m helping you,” she says. “Stop being terrible at your life.”

“I’m not terrible at my life,” he says, and Keyleth starts laughing helplessly. He looks so affronted, scowling at Zahra, and all but stamping his foot on the stained carpet of the orchestra room. He turns his scowl to her in response and says, “What, ballerina?”

“I have that practice room reserved tomorrow, from ten in the morning until two,” she says, instead of telling him that. “If you have some free time and you came by, I’d love it. You don’t have to for the whole time, of course—or any of the time, or—”

“Yeah, whatever,” he says, bending down to do up the catches on his cello case. “I’ll see if I’m free. If I remember. I’m going home. Z, come on if you’re coming.” He pulls his cello case up, nods at all of them, and heads for the door, dragging it behind him.

Zahra smiles. “He’s so ridiculous, really. Keyleth, some advice? Try not to pay too much attention to what Kash says. He’s not very good at talking.”

Keyleth ducks her head. “Yeah, well, I can, um, relate.”

“Good, you two should get along marvelously.” Zahra winks. It’s easy to see how she and Vex get along so well. “I would bet you a week’s pay that he’s there before you tomorrow, and that he stays until the very end.”

—

She’s right about him beating her there, as it turns out. When Keyleth walks down the hall to the practice room at 9:55 the next morning, Kash is already sitting outside it, squinting at his phone and cursing softly. She stops in front of him, gripping the shoulder strap of her bag tightly and wondering what to say to him—other than ‘thank you,’ which he doesn’t appear to like much—when he whoops and punches the air.

He looks up at her. “Did you know there’s a Ponyta in this building right now?” he says, grinning at her, and then he goes abruptly very red, despite his tan. “Uh. I mean.”

“Oh my god, there is?” she says, grabbing at her pocket and practically dropping her phone in her rush to get it and open the app. “I’m in here every day, how have I never seen one?”

“I’ve never seen it before either,” he says, sounding more relaxed. “And I use the music practice rooms in here a lot too, since our neighbors tend to get annoyed at about the fiftieth repetition of one ten bar sequence.”

“I can sympathize,” Keyleth says. “Oh, there is a Ponyta, wow, that’s amazing! I have to catch it.” She looks up and grins at him. “I can sympathize with you and your neighbors, I mean. On the one hand, the reason me and Vax and Vex and our roommate Percy—oh, do you know Percy? He does lights for the ballet and other theater, maybe you’ve seen him around? Anyway, we got the bottom floor instead of the top floor apartment, even though we moved in around the same time as our neighbors, because we dance, which means we tend to make a lot of thudding noises on the ground. On the other hand, our upstairs neighbors are in the orchestra, so…”

“They are?” Kash says. “I don’t know if I knew that.”

“Yeah,” Keyleth says, making a face as the Ponyta breaks out of a great throw, losing her a chance for another fifty XP. “Scanlan, Grog—”

“I’m so sorry,” Kash says dryly. “Also, I don’t know if I want to keep spending time with you, it might be contagious.”

Keyleth laughs. “You’re the one who works with them, maybe I should be avoiding you. And Pike lives with them, which I think probably cancels out all the bad vibes.”

“Pike lives with Scanlan?” Kash says. “Are they secretly together and just fucking with everyone?”

“No, they’re just good friends,” Keyleth says, watching the Ponyta break free again. “God, this thing is impossible to catch.”

“And his constant attempts to get her to go out with him are…?”

“Well, she doesn’t seem to mind much,” Keyleth says. “Ha! Got it. Thanks for the tip.”

“Sure,” Kash says. “I didn’t know you played Pokemon Go.”

“Everyone plays Pokemon Go,” Keyleth says. “I didn’t know you knew Scanlan and Grog and Pike.”

“It’s a small orchestra,” he says, shrugging. “I don’t know them well, or anything, but everyone kind of knows Scanlan. He’s very loud.”

“That’s true,” Keyleth says. “Hey, what’s your highest level Pokemon?”

“Oh,” Kash says. “Uh, I’ve got a really good Jolteon—”

The door to the practice room opens then, and they both jump slightly as Kynan, a member of the corps de ballet steps out, pulling a ski cap down over his ears. “Oh!” he says. “Keyleth, hi.”

“Hi, Kynan,” Keyleth says, smiling at him. “Good practice? Learning the steps okay?”

“Oh, yeah,” Kynan says. “This is such a great ballet!”

“Um,” Keyleth says. “Yeah, for sure.”

“Did you have the room next?” he says.

“Yeah, thanks,” Keyleth says.

Kynan gives Kash a funny look, who gives him a blank scowl in return, but he nods companionably at Keyleth and gives her a wave as he leaves, walking down the hall.

Kash gets up off the floor, reaching out to hold the door open for her. “Time to get started, I guess.”

“Oh,” Keyleth says, looking at his outstretched arm, holding the door wide. It’s surprisingly—thoughtful, considering everything else about Kash. But then, so is showing up at ten in the morning to play music for her while she rehearses her solo, so maybe she shouldn’t be surprised.

She steps into the room, pulling her boots off at the side of the room and opening her bag. Kash shoves his sneakers off without untying them, padding across the floor in his socks and sitting at the piano, playing a couple scales.

Keyleth takes off her coat and hat, putting on her ballet slippers and glances over at him. “It’s good that you do that,” she says.

“Huh?” he says. “Play scales? Yeah, I am a musician, you know. I know what I’m doing.”

“No!” she says. “No, that’s not what I meant, I meant taking off your shoes. Non-dancers don’t, a lot of the time, and it’s bad for the floor.”

“I work with a ballet company,” he says dryly. “This might shock you, but I do talk to people sometimes. Well. Zahra does, anyway.”

She laughs. “I wasn’t going to say it, but…”

“Hey, I talked to you,” he says, but he doesn’t sound all that offended.

“You came in and asked if I was dying,” she says, biting her lip and trying to keep her voice light and teasing. “I don’t know if that counts.”

“Shut up and stretch,” he says.

“Yeah, yeah,” she says, grinning. He might actually not hate her, because that actually sounded like a joke. “Want to give me some mood music?”

To her surprise, he actually does, messing around for a few moments before he seamlessly transitions into an awkward arrangement of the Overture of 1812.

“This is mood music?” she says, giggling as she gets one of her legs up onto the barre and bends over.

“Yeah,” he says. “It’s, like, battle music. My mood is almost always, ‘come fight me, asshole.’ Isn’t yours?”

“You know, that explains so much about your personality.”

“Fuck you. Stretch. Fight your goddamn muscles.”

“Uh-huh,” she says, grinning. “Keep up the battle music, I really feel like it’s helping.”

“I feel like maybe you’re mocking me and my battle music,” he says. “Careful, or I’ll change to torture music.”

“You have torture music?” she says. “Who has torture music? What is torture music?”

The Overture slows and then turns into something much slower and down tempo and very familiar. “This,” he says, “is torture music.”

She tilts her head to the side. “Is this Pachelbel’s Canon?”

“You asked for torture music,” he says.

“Isn’t this wedding music?”

“Yeah, like I said, torture.”

She opens and closes her mouth several times. “I can’t work out whether or not you’re joking,” she admits at last. “So I’m not sure what I should say.”

“I never joke,” he says, very seriously, but then in the same breath, he adds, “I’m kind of joking about weddings, though I’ve played a bunch of them, and honestly, they’re excruciatingly boring, so I’m also kind of not. But I’m not even a little joking about Pachelbel’s Canon, this shit is the worst.”

“It’s pretty!” she protests.

“Have you ever played the cello part?” he says. “Here’s what it is.” He takes his right hand off the piano entirely and plays eight long, slow notes with his left, and then starts over again at the beginning. “This is all it is,” he says, without stopping. “All the way until the end. The entire time. This shit is the worst. And I have to play it all the goddamn time.”

“Really?” she says. “Just this, the whole time?”

“The whole time,” he says.

“That’s…bad.”

He snorts. “Yeah. Bad. That’s the word I’d use, all right.”

She looks down. “Okay, bad was a bad—an uninspired choice of words. Sorry.”

“No, it’s…” He sighs. “Can I go back to battle music now? Actually, I feel like a little Rachmaninoff, how about that?” And without waiting for a response the slow music changes abruptly into something loud, slightly angry sounding, and very impressive.

“This is good,” she agrees, and she finishes the rest of her stretches without talking.

—

Kash stays until the end of the four hours she’d booked the room for without complaint, playing the same music—sometimes the same few bars—over and over again until even she’s sick of it, and she can only imagine how he feels. It’s astoundingly considerate, and she tries desperately, as she packs up, to think of a way to thank him without letting the words actually cross his lips, since he seems to hate that.

“I’m starving,” he says flatly, pushing his feet back into his shoes. “I think we missed lunch time.”

“Oh, yeah, I guess!” she says. Lunch, that’s something—if he lets her pay, that seems like a decent way of expressing her appreciation that in no way involves an actual thanks. “Um, I’m sorry. Listen, if you’d like, we could—?” Her phone rings, cutting him off with the march from the Nutcracker, the only ballet her father has ever really liked, and she winces. “Sorry, excuse me, I have to—”

“Yeah, obviously,” he says. “Go ahead.”

“Hi, Dad,” she says, trying to sound upbeat and fiddling with the zipper on her bag. “How are you doing?”

“Hi, Princess,” he says. “I’m good. Things are going well. How are—”

“Didn’t you have some big case?” she says quickly. “Is that still going, or did you finish it up?”

“Oh,” he says, sounding surprised. “It’s still going, actually, but I wanted to ask you about—”

“Great, you should tell me all about it!” she says. “I’ve been really curious, and I keep meaning to call and ask about it, but rehearsals have been going until pretty late.” She knows it’s the wrong thing to say the instant it comes out of her mouth, and she leans forward to very gently bang her head against the wall.

“Rehearsals?” he says. “Those would be for, ah, Giselle, yes? How is that going? You’re taking good care of yourself, making sure to see a doctor about any falls you take? I don’t want you hurting yourself.”

“Giselle, yeah,” she says, ignoring the rest. He’s not wrong about ballet being dangerous, but that doesn’t mean she needs to hear about how completely she could ruin her career and life with one bad fall. He’s worried, that’s nice. So is she. “So, are you working the case personally, or is someone else taking care of it? How high profile is it? Do you think you’ll get some press? That would be good, right, court of public opinion? Might help if you want them to settle.”

“If we want them to settle, but not if we want to win the case,” he says sternly, and she breathes a silent sigh of relief as he allows the subject change, slumping forward and resting her head against the wall. “The way the jury works, if we get too much media coverage…”

“Mm-hmm,” she says, closing her eyes and letting him talk. “Gee, Dad, you’re right.”

She doesn’t even notice when Kash slips out the door, and she doesn’t see the slip of paper he leaves on top of her bag until after she hangs up the phone and he’s long gone.

—

Percy’s home last that night, since he’s embroiled in tech week for the local production of Death of a Salesman and hating every second. The director is the biggest micromanaging asshole to ever work in the theater, apparently, which is really saying a lot. She waits for him in their room, curled up on her bed idly playing phone games and trying not to fall asleep.

“Oh, hello,” he says when he comes in. “I didn’t expect you to still be up. Don’t you have an early call tomorrow?”

“Yes,” she admits. She opens her mouth to say, ‘I wanted to ask you something,’ but chickens out at the last second, and what comes out is, “How was rehearsal?”

“Oh, lovely,” he says. “The director came over and told me what levels the lights should be at.”

“The actual levels?” she says. “Not just brighter or darker, but—”

“Oh, no, he said, ‘Why don’t you try that cue at 50 instead?’ and I said, ‘Certainly, sir,’ like a good little sycophant,” Percy says bitterly. “I’d like to go back in time, figure out when I decided I wanted to work in the arts, and shoot myself. Some people should not be allowed to direct.” He glances over at her. “Why are you still awake?”

“No particular reason,” she says weakly.

He raises his eyebrows. “Really,” he says, coming over to sit on the bed next to her. He puts an arm around her shoulders and says, “Would you like to try that lie again?”

“I wanted to ask you something,” she admits. “But I feel like maybe you’re not in a great mood, and it’s not, like, important, so we can just forget about it, okay?”

“Uh-huh,” Percy says. “Not important in a real way, out of curiosity, or not important in a you don’t want to talk about it kind of way? I’m only asking for science.”

“Oh, for science,” she says. “Well, in that case—kind of both? I mean, it’s actually not important, and it’s so not important that I feel silly actually waiting up to talk to you about it.”

“Mm,” he says. “Well, now I’m curious, so you have to tell me.”

“Hey!”

“I’ll stay up all night wondering about it,” he says. “Do you really want to be the cause of me tossing and turning and being very unhealthy about my sleep habits?”

“You’re already very unhealthy about your sleep habits,” she says. “I’m not sure how much worse I can really make it.”

“If it’s silly,” he says, “then it isn’t a big deal. Sate my curiosity, explain everything to me.”

She sighs and sits up straight to reach over to the bookshelf near her bed, grabbing the scrap of paper Kash had left for her off of it and pressing it into Percy’s hand. “What do you think that means?” she says.

“Well,” Percy says after a moment. “It appears to be a Chipotle receipt.”

“On the other side,” she says, shoving him and grabbing it so she can turn it around and smack it back into his hands. “Come on, Percy.”

“Oh, would you look at that,” he says, ignoring her. “Someone’s written on the back of this Chipotle receipt.” He looks at it for a minute, and then he says, “I have to admit, it seems somewhat self-explanatory.”

“Self-explanatory?” she says. “How is it self-explanatory?”

“Well, it’s a phone number, and then he’s written, ‘So you can let me know when you need a pianist’ and his name,” Percy says patiently. “That seems reasonably clear.”

“Yeah, but, like.” She flops back onto the bed with a sigh, staring up at the ceiling. Percy let her cover it with dumb glow-in-the-dark stars like she had as a kid, and she traces the deeply familiar constellations with her eyes. “I don’t get it.”

Percy puts a hand on her ankle and rubs it with his thumb. “Him, or the note?”

“Is both an option?” she says. “Every time I talk to him, I feel like he doesn’t like me, but any time he does anything, I feel like he must, or it doesn’t make sense. Maybe he’s just a really grouchy person who’s also, like, a saint.”

“Good people don’t have to be friendly or cheerful,” Percy says.

“Do you think he hates me?” Keyleth says. “I feel like maybe he hates me.”

Percy drops the receipt onto her face, and she bats it away, making a face at him.

“It’s seeming increasingly unlikely,” he says pointedly. “Considering.”

“Maybe he’s just a good person!” she protests. “And then also he hates me.”

Percy sighs. “Then let him help you and hate you,” he says. “Does it matter?”

She makes a face at him. “I don’t like it when people don’t like me. I know I’m not, you know, charming, but I don’t think I’m a bad person. I want people to like me.”

“Well, if he doesn’t, that’s probably his problem,” Percy says. “Especially since he barely knows you, so it’s not as if he has much of a reason.”

“I didn’t remember who he was—”

“He’s in the pit orchestra, not someone you actually see often,” Percy says. “It’s not as if you’d ever spoken to him.”

“But I had!” she says. “He says we talked once, but I don’t remember, and it’s driving me absolutely insane.”

“You probably said hi to him in the hallway once,” Percy says. “And if he’s holding a grudge because you don’t remember that, then you should probably stop spending time with him. He’s not entitled to—”

“I don’t think that’s what it’s about,” Keyleth says. “He’s friends with Vex’s friend, and he doesn’t feel like a bad person.”

“Oh, that’s comforting,” Percy mutters, but quietly enough that she can pretend she didn’t hear. Louder, he says, “If he’s a dick, he’s a dick. You shouldn’t be losing sleep over that.”

“I wouldn’t be, if he were just a dick,” Keyleth says. “I just can’t tell, and also—”

“Also?” Percy prompts after a moment of silence.

“My dad called,” she says, shrugging her shoulders, though it’s awkward to do lying down. “So I guess I’m feeling generally…”

“Bad about yourself?” Percy says. He squeezes her ankle. “Was it horrible?”

“No,” she says. “No, it was fine, I got him talking about some case, and then I said I had to go because I was meeting Vax.”

“Does he still think you’re dating Vax?”

She huffs. “Look, it’s better than when he thought Vex and Vax had some incestuous twin-marriage going on.”

“Oh, definitely,” Percy says. “You know, I don’t think artists are nearly as kinky as the rest of the world seems to think they are. Or else you three are holding out on me.”

“Anyway, if I say I have to do something with Vax, he usually lets me go,” Keyleth says, ignoring that. “So it works out well in a bunch of ways.”

“Because then you get to stop pretending to care about environmental law,” Percy says.

She sits up so quickly she gets a bit of a head rush. “I do care!”

Percy eyes her. “You know, I understand the urge to continue a legacy of—”

“I care,” she says harshly, cutting him off, “about environmental law. That’s not what this is. I care a lot. I think that the work my father’s company does is invaluable, and I should be—I mean, I am grateful and honored to have a future there. And maybe eventually—” She presses her lips tight together on the end of that sentence and looks down at her lap.

Percy doesn’t say anything, but she can feel his fingers tapping on her leg as he looks at her, frowning. “Keyleth,” he says, slowly, and she shakes her head.

“I should go to sleep,” she says, pointedly flopping back onto the bed and dragging the comforter over herself.

He sighs and crosses the room to his own bed, rammed up against a drafty wall of their two bedroom apartment that was all four people on artists’ salaries could afford. Fuck, her father’s really right about her entire life.

She shuts her eyes firmly, listening to him change into sweatpants and a t-shirt before he flicks the light switch, plunging them into darkness. The sheets across the room rustle as he gets into bed, and then he says, very quietly, “I don’t recommend feeling obligated to live a life.”

She doesn’t open her eyes, but she does turn onto her side so that she’s facing him. “What do you recommend?”

“You know, I’m not sure,” he says. “I’ll let you know when I work it out.”

“Always with the cautionary tales,” she says. “Never with the positive life lessons.”

“Have you seen my life?” he says. “I’m not certain what you expected.”

“Percy—”

“No, don’t be supportive. It’s far too late at night for that, and we both have early call times tomorrow,” he says, sounding amused. “Let’s just skip over the affirmations and assurances for tonight, hmm? I’ll take them as read.”

“You’re a terrible best friend,” she says. “And I love you. Good night.”

“Good night, Keyleth.”

—

She texts Kash the next morning over coffee, because she’s too tired to get anxious and overthink it.

Vex is sitting across their narrow table from her, one hand over her eyes as she rests her weight on her arm, propped on the table, her legs slung over her brother’s lap. Vax leans forward until his forehead hits the table and says, muffled, “I hate mornings.”

“Uh-huh,” Keyleth says, scowling at her cursor as her phone autocorrects something wrong again.

“You’re intent,” Vex says, lifting her arm up enough to squint across the table. “Did something go terribly wrong? Did the theater burn down, tragically meaning we can’t go to work this morning?”

Keyleth laughs and hits send on the message, sticking her phone determinedly back into her pocket and gulping coffee. “No, I was just checking the weather.”

“It’s cold and miserable,” Vax says. “What is there to check?”

Vex reaches over and slaps him. “Don’t be so negative.”

“You just said you wanted our place of business to burn down.”

“Yes,” Vex says. “Which is hopeful and optimistic.”

“Unfortunately,” Keyleth says, “it didn’t, so we should go to work.”

“Ugh,” Vex says. “Yes, all right, if you insist.”

Keyleth puts her phone in an inner pocket of her bag as they grab their things to go, so that she won’t notice even if she does get a notification, which means she also won’t be able to wonder why she hasn’t, and leads the twins out the door.

—

Rehearsal for the three of them ends early, luckily, since the most of the afternoon and evening is devoted to Quall working with the corps de ballet. Vex and Vax grab a practice room together to work their pas de deux, and she goes to her usual room, naps for twenty minutes underneath the piano, and gets up to start stretching and warming up.

She tells herself she definitely isn’t wondering if Kash is going to show up, which is good, because he doesn’t until halfway through the afternoon, opening the door and stepping in while she’s in the middle of a series of glissades.

“Hey,” he says, and she practically falls out of them, tripping over her own feet like an amateur.

“Hi,” she says, breathing heavily. She’s developing a twitch in her right thigh, her side is cramping, and she’s covered in sweat, which is just about par for the course for a serious rehearsal. “I didn’t know you were coming.”

He frowns. “I texted.”

“Oh, I—I haven’t checked my phone.”

“Yeah, that would make that harder.”

“Oh,” she says, looking down at her feet. “Yeah, I guess it would. I mean—I should’ve checked it, I just didn’t think, and then—whatever. I don’t know. Sorry.”

“Yeah, you’ve committed a heinous crime,” he says, and she still can’t tell if he’s joking, just like always.

After a moment where she doesn’t say anything, he shrugs and takes his shoes off, walking across the room to the piano. He opens it and plays a few quick scales, the notes rippling through the air, even though the acoustics in this room are as terrible as in any dance space. “Where did you want to go from?” he says.

“Um,” she says. “I don’t know.” She walks over to the side of the room and grabs her water bottle, drinking slowly. “Can I ask you a question?”

“I kind of feel like I can’t stop you,” he says, his fingers coming to a stop on the keys.

“I kind of feel like you hate me,” she says, and his hands must slip, because the piano makes a loud, discordant sound. She groans, pressing the heel of her hand to her forehead and leaning against the mirrored wall. “I didn’t mean to say that.”

“Was that the question?” he says, after a moment.

“No, definitely not,” she says. “Ignore that. Just—forget I said it at all. It was stupid. I wanted to ask—never mind.”

He plays a scale again, but slowly, and then he stops, halfway down the octave. It sits unfinished in the air, and it feels wrong. “I don’t hate you,” he says. “I mean, you’re annoying, but—shit, that’s not what I meant to say either. I, uh. Mostly I’m just not good at talking to people, but I, uh, I don’t hate you. I—” She looks up in time to see him grimace at his hands, still resting on the piano, halfway through a scale. “I mean, you’re fine, you’re cool. It’s fine.”

“Oh,” she says, feeling off-balance. “That’s, um. I’m glad to hear it.” The silence lingers, oppressively, and she finds herself blurting out, “Can you finish the scale?”

“Huh?” he says, looking up at her. “Oh.” He laughs, sounding surprised. “Uh, yeah, sure.” He finishes it quickly, his fingers running over the notes, and then he laughs again. “There’s, uh, this dumb story I’ve heard, about Mozart, where—you don’t care.”

“I care,” she says quickly. “What’s the story?”

He plays a scale again, slower and all the way through. “There’s this story, and it’s probably not true, but it’s funny, so—anyway, people say that the guy who had to wake Mozart up in the morning, his servant or whatever, he used to do it by going to Mozart’s piano and playing the first seven notes of a scale.” Kash plays them himself, slowly and deliberately. “And it would drive Mozart so nuts that he’d have to get up out of bed, walk over, and play the last note.” He hits the final note of the octave and grins. “And that was Mozart’s alarm clock.”

She laughs too, pressing one of her hands over her mouth. “I hope it is true,” she says. “I can’t help imagining cranky Mozart with bedhead having to get up and hit a piano key every morning.”

“It’s a good story, even if it’s kind of stupid,” Kash says. He puts his hands in his lap. “What did you want to ask me?”

“Oh,” she says, feeling the humor drain out of her. “Well.” She looks down. “That is—when did we talk?”

“What?” he says.

“You said we’d talked, when you realized I didn’t know who you were,” she says. “And I’ve been trying, and I still don’t remember, and it’s driving me nuts, and—”

“Oh,” he says, cutting her off. “Yeah, uh, in retrospect it was kind of unfair for me to expect you to remember that.”

“I’m not a bad person,” she says, probably too loudly.

“What?” he says. “No, god. You’re a good person, obviously you’re a good person, but you were, like, really drunk.”

“I—what?”

“So drunk,” he says. “I don’t think I really realized how drunk you were at the time, since I was pretty drunk too, but in retrospect, I think the only people I’ve ever seen who were drunker than you had to get their stomachs pumped.”

She gapes at him. “I…don’t remember that.”

“No kidding,” he says, dry. He shrugs. “Anyway, there’s not much to the story. You were drunk, I was drunk, we were at a bar, we talked. Whatever. Big deal. Sorry, I didn’t realize it was bothering you.”

“When did this happen?” she says, trying to root around in her memory for her fuzzier nights of drinking. There’s an embarrassing number of them.

“A few months ago, I guess,” he says. “Don’t worry if you can’t remember. Like I said: drunk.” He eyes her and adds, “Though if you aren’t sure which of the blackout drunk nights a couple of months ago you could have met me at, I’m kind of judging your lifestyle choices.”

She covers her face with her hands. “Oh my god. What did we talk about?”

“Well,” he says, “you were really drunk, and I was really drunk, so it started out with ‘I like your hair’ and quickly segued into one of those deep, heartfelt conversations about incredibly personal shit that you only really have when you’re on something. There might’ve been meaning of life stuff going on.”

“Oh my god.”

“Yeah, it was actually really significant for me, so it’s a little hurtful that you don’t—”

“I’m sorry!” she says, practically on a wail.

“Keyleth,” he says, and when she makes herself look up, he’s biting his lip on a grin and there’s a faint blush tinging his cheeks. “I’m teasing you, chill.”

“Oh,” she says, staring at him. “Oh!” She laughs, as much from relief as anything. “Oh, yeah, of course. Wow. Way to freak me out!”

“Yeah, sorry,” he says. He looks to the side. “So, uh, is this a good time to mention that I might, possibly know some details about your life that you might be uncomfortable with me knowing?”

She stares at him. “Oh my god, weirdly personal drunken conversation.”

“Weirdly personal drunken conversation,” he agrees. “If it’s any consolation, if you remembered it at all, you’d definitely know some stuff about me that I’d be equally uncomfortable about.”

“Yeah, but I don’t.”

“Yeah, it’s a big comfort,” he says.

“Kash!”

“Sorry,” he says. “Look, I wasn’t sure whether or not it was weird to tell you that, but I guess I decided it’s weirder if you don’t know.”

She looks at the ceiling, trying to get a grip on her mortification. “I’m kind of having a moment of horrified and embarrassed anxiety as I consider every terrible thing I could’ve told you while I was wasted.”

“Yeah, that’s fair,” he says. “That’s what I’d be doing.”

She makes herself look at him. “What did I tell you?”

“Uh,” he says. “Stuff. About your life?”

“This definitely worse for me if I don’t know,” she tells him. “Especially because I’m coming up with a lot of really horrifying reasons for why you don’t want to say.”

“Yeah, uh,” he says. “Can we be drunk for this conversation?”

“Are you trying to make me forget again?”

“God, no,” he says fervently. “Then we’d have to have it again.”

“I’m supposed to be practicing,” she says, looking around the room. “I’m a professional in an extremely unforgiving line of work, I can’t just slack off because I need to have a second awkward drunken conversation with a coworker.”

“I mean, it’s not like we’re getting a whole lot done right now,” Kash says. “But okay, yeah, sure, let’s be professionals. Where did you want to start?”

“Just like that?”

“It’s possible I’ve somehow given you the impression that I want to have this conversation,” he says, dry as dust. “Let me correct you.”

She laughs despite herself. “Okay, um—let me stretch a little, warm my muscles up again, and then we can go from the top? I want to try and make myself get all the way through it before we work anything in particular.”

“Sure,” he says, shrugging. “Just think of me as your iTunes track.”

“You’re actually a lot better,” she says absently, stretching. “I mean! Obviously you’re better, that’s so—naturally you’d be better! Duh.”

“You know what, I’m just going to take the compliment,” he says. “Stop driving yourself nuts trying to make it sound less insulting.”

“I’m not good at talking to people,” she says.

“Worked that one out for myself, yeah,” he says. “Which is unfortunate, because neither am I, so this is going really well for both of us.”

“Um,” Keyleth says. “Yeah, that’s. This is…functional.”

“Functional is our tagline,” he agrees. “Mine alone is ‘better than an iTunes track,’ naturally.”

“I didn’t mean it like that!” she protests. “I just meant—it’s nice. Having you here. It’s nice of you. And I like—I really like it when you play for me.”

Kash clears his throat and looks at the piano. “Uh, yeah. Okay. One nice and better than an iTunes track coming up.” He starts playing almost immediately, making her fall over herself trying to get on track with the music and start dancing, which was probably his intention, because by the time they get through, she’s gotten so distracted by how badly she flubbed the first half that she’s completely forgotten what they were talking about.

—

She drags him to her favorite bar after she’s done practicing, shoves him onto a stool, waves the bartender over, and says, “Gin and tonic, and whatever he’s having.”

“You don’t have to pay for me,” he says.

“It’s fine,” she says. “This was my idea. What do you want to drink? Liquor, not beer.”

“Uh, whiskey and soda,” he says, after a moment. “I guess.”

“Great,” Keyleth says. “Those, and a shot of tequila for us each.”

“What?” Kash says.

Keyleth slides her card across the bar and says, “Just open up a tab, okay?”

“Tequila? Really?” Kash says. “Isn’t that a little extreme?”

“Tequila is classic and expedient,” she says firmly. “I’m trying to get this over with quickly. Like ripping off a band-aid.”

“A band-aid of drunkenness?” he says sarcastically. “No, sorry, I get it. Get drunk enough to have this conversation quickly so that we can get it all over with and done. Sure.”

“That’s pretty much it, yeah,” she says. She tries to smile. “Come on, this is, like, our thing, right? Getting drunk together?”

“If you’re freaking out about what you said to me,” Kash says, ignoring that and getting right to the heart of the matter, like an asshole, “you shouldn’t be. I…like you.” He rolls his eyes right after he says it, but he looks awkward when he does it, and she’s starting to get the idea that he’s just really uncomfortable with genuine emotion. “You were cool, when we hung out. I mean, in a drunk way.”

“I thought I was annoying,” she says, to have something to say while she processes that.

“Yeah, in an annoying way too,” he says immediately. Then he looks at her and makes a face. “It’s really annoying how much I don’t hate you, honestly.”

“Oh,” she says, and then, with relief, she adds, “oh, look, tequila.”

“Oh, thank god,” he says, and the he downs his in one go.

“And you didn’t even want me to order it,” she says, copying him and only choking on the burn a little bit.

“Yeah, I was wrong, you were right, try not to get a big head about it,” he says. “Please let the rest of the drinks be coming soon; I can’t do this sober.”

“Yeah,” she says, playing with her shot glass. “That’s very—yeah. I mean, me neither. Do we drink too much?”

“That was a segue,” Kash says. “And I wish it were a segue that came with booze. And also, like, do you drink every night?”

“Of course not,” she says. “I’m a dancer.”

“Not an alcoholic,” he says. “You’re fine.”

“Thanks,” she says, smiling. “Very comforting.”

“Yeah, that’s what everyone says. Kash: a very comforting guy.”

“I’ll start saying that,” she says. “And before you know it, it’ll have caught on.”

He snorts. “Yeah, in the ‘Little John’ way, maybe. ‘Comforting Kash.’ It even alliterates.”

“I think you’re sweet,” she says, and then, horrified, “Oh my god, it was one shot.”

“Seriously,” Kash says. “You can’t possibly be delusional already.”

“No, I mean—I meant it,” she says, and she’s a little surprised to find that she did. “I just didn’t mean to say it.”

He chokes on air. “You really are delusional. Do I need to call a doctor?”

“I’m not delusional,” she says. “You’re really nice to me, you just pretend you aren’t.”

“I’m an asshole!”

“Well, I mean, that too,” she admits.

“Well,” he says, staring at her, and then he looks down at the wooden bar. “As long as we agree on that, I guess.”

“Yeah, um—oh, alcohol, that’s good timing,” she says, grabbing for her gin and tonic. “Drink fast.”

“No worries on that front,” Kash mutters, gulping whiskey and not looking at her. “Wild horses couldn’t drag me away from this alcohol.”

She giggles. “Ain’t no river wide enough, ain’t no mountain high enough to drag me away from my gin.”

“What is this, the reworking love songs into alcoholic songs sweepstakes?” he says, but there’s a tiny grin on his face. He adds, after a second, “Fly me to the moon, let me play among the stars. In other words, buy me a drink.”

She laughs, taking another long sip of her drink. “I like that one.” She plays with her straw. “I do still want to know what we talked about last time we drank together, though.”

Kash grimaces. “Yeah. Figured.” He takes another sip. “Look, it was—you know, it got personal and stuff and we talked about, uh, our families? And stuff?”

“Oh, god,” Keyleth says. “Did I talk about my father?”

“Uh,” he says. “Yeah?”

“Oh, god,” she repeats. “What did I say?”

“Oh, you know, classic teen movie stuff,” he says. “You know, ‘it’s not my dream, dad, it’s yours!’ I think you might’ve made that joke, actually, I might be stealing it from you.” He rips at one of the cocktail napkins. “Stuff like that. He supports you, but he doesn’t want you to do the ballet thing, because it’s an impossible industry to make it in and everyone screws up their bodies for life. Which makes you feel like shit, because it feels like he’s telling you that you aren’t good enough, even if you know he’s just saying he’s worried. Oh, and also, you’re on a time limit to really make it as a ballerina, and you don’t want to go to law school and work for your dad’s firm right now, even if you might eventually.”

“Ugh,” she says, letting her head fall forward onto the bar. “That’s so embarrassing.” She turns her head enough to look at him. “So you really knew what I meant when I said that my life was ruined, huh?”

“Oh. Uh, yeah,” he says. “If you don’t get a job with a better company and get successful, your dad makes you go to law school and stop dancing.” He shrugs awkwardly. “Sucks, but what I don’t get is, how does he make you? Like, when we talked about it, I assumed he was financing the dancing thing, but Z says you guys live in a pit, and you can’t afford an iPod, so I feel like that’s not true.”

“Oh,” she says, squirming in her seat. “You’re going to think it’s stupid.”

“Yeah, probably,” he says, and she laughs, somehow relieved.

“Okay, yeah, um,” she says. “I mostly just do what he tells me?”

He stares at her. “Are you serious?”

“Yes?”

“You’re right. I do think that’s stupid.”

“Yeah, so does everyone else,” she says. “But it’s—I love my father. I respect my father. And I don’t want to disappoint him, you know? He’s just trying to do what’s right for me. It is hard to make it as a professional dancer. He’s not wrong. Being a lawyer is more useful and more reliable and better.”

“I…” Kash trails off. “I think you’re a, a beautiful dancer. And I guess I don’t know that much about ballet, but I’d pay a lot to see you dance. So I think you should keep doing that.”

She stares at him, her heart beating about five times too fast. It’s awfully hot in the bar, she thinks faintly. She wishes they hadn’t turned the heat up so high. Clearing her throat, she says quietly, “See? Sweet.”

“God, fuck off,” he mutters, not meeting her eyes. “Don’t make it a thing.”

“I kind of think it might be a thing,” she says, and he hunches his shoulders and ignores her. She looks down, biting her lip. “Is that all I said?”

“Oh,” he says. “Uh, that was the big stuff. I mean, you said you were jealous of Vex for always getting the leads, and then you said about a billion times how terrible you felt just saying that, and then you said you wanted her parts. Which seems fair, honestly. I’d want her parts if I were you.”

“Oh, no,” she says.

“Seriously, anyone would be jealous,” he says. “You’re still living together, so clearly you aren’t letting it affect your personal relationship, or whatever, and that’s the important part.”

“She’s better than I am,” Keyleth says miserably.

“I think she might just be better at dancing with Vax, honestly,” Kash says seriously. “Which, like, that’s weird all on its own, right, because they’re siblings, and they keep dancing opposite each other romantically—”

“Siblings dancing together isn’t really that weird,” she says. “Ballroom dancers do it all the time, and they have to be, like, sexy. No one expects ballet dancers to be sexy.”

“It’s weird,” he says firmly. “But they grew up dancing together, so it makes sense that she’d be better at doing it with him, and he’s the best male dancer they’ve got, so here we are. You just need to get to dance with someone else where no one expects you to be weirdly telepathic with your twin brother to have an artistic partnership.”

“So I have to get a position with another company,” she says, draining the rest of her drink. “You’re not telling me anything I don’t already know.”

“Okay, well,” he says. “Yeah.”

“Yeah,” she says. “God, I need another drink.”

“I think maybe we should switch to beer,” he says, finishing his whiskey. “Don’t you have rehearsal tomorrow?”

“I really, really do,” she says, with a groan. “But not until the afternoon?”

“Oh, well, in that case.” He flags down the waiter and says, “Guinness, please. Keyleth?”

“Um, same,” she says, because she likes it fine and it’s easier than trying to work out what weird local stuff they have on draft. “On my tab.”

“Oh, come on, I can get this round,” he says.

“Nope,” she says. “I’m about to make you tell me embarrassing things about yourself as payback.”

“Oh,” he says. “Yeah, you can pay.”

“Knew you’d see it my way.”

“I don’t know what you want to know,” he says, tearing another piece off his napkin.

“Well, you said you told me weirdly personal stuff last time we got drunk together,” she says. “But I don’t remember. I feel like that isn’t fair.”

“Yeah, see,” he says, “the problem with that is, I’m not wasted. So I don’t really want to talk about any of that.”

“That’s what the beer’s for,” she says.

“Oh, that’s what the beer’s for,” he says. “Great. Well, that’s all right, then. No problems there.”

“Oh, come on,” she says, too relaxed to really take him seriously. “You have to admit it’s not fair.”

“It’s not my fault you drank too much and blacked out,” he says. “I feel like that’s the opposite of my fault, really. I was just an innocent bystander.”

“A likely story,” she says, though it’s probably true, as two large glasses of beer are place in front of them. “Here, drink some beer.”

“I feel like I should be saying no to peer pressure,” he says dryly, and she giggles.

“All the cool kids are doing it.”

“Yeah?” he says, making a show of looking around. “Where are they?”

“Funny,” she says. “Drink your beer.”

“Yeah, yeah,” he says, sipping. “Slave driver.”

“That’s what you call the girl who buys you drinks, yeah.”

“That was my thought process.” He takes another long gulp and shrugs. “I’m not going to just randomly start spilling secrets about my life.”

“But that’s what I did,” she protests. “Come on, don’t you have any family drama you can tell me about to make me feel better about everything you randomly know about me?”

“Uh,” he says. “I mean, not really. I guess kind of? I’m, um, an orphan, I guess, is the technical term. I grew up in foster care. That’s actually how I know Z. We tell everyone we’re roommates, and we are, but we started out as foster siblings, placed in the same home. We stuck together.”

“Oh, Kash,” Keyleth says. “I’m so sorry.”

“It’s not really a thing,” he says. “It’s just something that happened in my life, that’s all. Foster care was…fine, I guess, whatever. And I got Z out of it, so.”

“Well, that’s… I mean, I guess…”

“Please don’t be sympathetic,” he says. “It’s mostly just awkward.”

“Okay,” she says, though she can’t help feeling sympathetic. For all her problems with her father, at least he’s still around, and she knows how much it sucks to miss a parent.

“Yeah, well,” he says, taking another drink. “Was that awkwardly personal enough for you, or should I keep going? I can probably come up with some childhood sob stories, if you really need me too.”

“No, that’s okay,” she says, feeling embarrassed. “Sorry, I shouldn’t have made you—I mean. Was that all you told me last time?”

“I talked around some other stuff,” he says. “And I might have implied something about—long story. But there is no level of drunk you could get that could induce me to actually talk about that.”

“Okay,” she says. “I mean—okay.” She smiles ruefully. “Sorry I got drunk and whined to you and then forgot all about it. And then that I made you do it again, kind of.”

“Whatever,” he says. “Glad I know you forgot. I kind of thought you were just ignoring me.”

“Oh,” she says. “No, I wouldn’t—”

“Yeah, I get that now.”

“Oh. Good.”

“Yeah. So.” He clears his throat. “Seriously, Vex and Vax don’t think it’s weird to keep playing lovers?”

Keyleth laughs, relieved. “They complain about it sometimes, but I think they like dancing together, and there aren’t a whole lot of ballets with main characters that aren’t in love. And Vax always says that if anyone’s going to be picking his sister up and throwing her around, it had better be him.”

“I feel like Giselle shouldn’t be picking up Prince Albrecht and throwing him around,” Kash says. “But maybe that’s just me.”

“It’s such a weird show to genderbend!” she says. “This show is so weird! And the choreography keeps changing, and it’s driving me nuts.”

He pats her on the shoulder. “There, there. You’ll always have alcohol.”

“Thanks,” she says. “You’re so helpful.”

—

It would be easy to leave it there, she thinks the next day, texting him her practice schedule for the week and checking to see when the room is open and when they’re both free for the rest of the rehearsal period. They’re friendly. He definitely doesn’t hate her. They could have a good, solid working relationship.

But that’s not really what she wants. Talking to Kash is a disaster about ninety percent of the time, because they both suck so very hard, but the last ten percent is funny and quick and easy, and she finds herself looking forward to his deadpan sarcasm.

It would be easy and sensible and safe and not awkward at all to just wait to see him at the next practice time and try to talk to him before and after and during and build a friendship organically, but she texts him anyway, because she’s a moron and she wants to.

Heard there was a pikachu spawning site on the edge of town, by the goodwill, but it’s so cold.

That’s safely neutral, she hopes, and she knows he likes Pokemon Go, so hopefully he won’t think she’s horrifyingly dorky—or maybe he’ll just think she’s a whiner and she should stop complaining and—

And he’s texted back.

There’s a shop over there with really good hot cocoa and teas, really warming

That’s promising—

I’ll show you where it is if you show me where the pikachu are. Don’t hold out on me, ballerina

That’s even better. That’s amazing, that’s perfect, and she sends him a quick, Meet you in front of the goodwill in 20. Those teas had better be as good and warm as you said, before she runs to grab her coat and hat.

“Going somewhere?” Percy says from his seat on the couch, looking up from his computer and blinking at her. “Don’t you have the day off?”

“I’m going Pokemon hunting with Kash,” she says cheerfully.

“The guy who might hate you?” he says, raising his eyebrows.

Her phone beeps and she pulls it out, opening the new message.

I’ll buy you one to prove it. I think I owe you like a million drinks anyway so some of them can be tea

She grins so wide she thinks she probably looks a little crazy. “He definitely doesn’t hate me. See you later, Percy!” she calls out cheerfully, practically running out the door.

—

Rehearsals are exhausting and long and all the time, so she doesn’t have that much time to actually hang out with Kash, but she gets in the habit of texting him random things that he pretends piss him off, just so that he’ll respond with an all-caps keyboard smash when she sends him the millionth cat video.

“You’re annoying” is starting to sound like a term of endearment. She’d be worried about her reactions to insults, but she’s really pretty sure that’s how he means it, considering he says it all the time and then watches the cat videos anyway. With Kash, she’s working out, you spend a lot of time reading between the lines.

She likes to think she’s getting good at it.

Besides, the first time she responds to him telling her she’s annoying by saying, “Yeah, I like you a lot too,” he chokes and makes a lot of sputtering sounds before he mutters something inaudible and changes the subject, which is, quite frankly, hilarious.

And getting to practice with an actual, living musician in the room is beyond amazing, because he can breathe with her, and the music moves in exactly the way she wants it to—just how a conductor would pause or linger or accelerate. It’s perfect, and she can feel herself getting better, not just technically, but artistically. She’d felt disconnected from Hilarion since she’d started dancing the ballet, and she still kind of thinks he’s an ass, but the frantic desperation of his dance to the death in the second act is starting to feel honest. She gets it. She can do it.

Quall even looks straight at her after rehearsal one day, when she’s fallen to the ground, dead and trying to keep her gasps for breath shallow, and says, “Adequate, Ashari.”

“Damn,” Vax says cheerfully afterwards, slapping her on the back. “I didn’t think Quall gave compliments.”

“Does that count as a compliment?” Vex says. “I mean, clearly what he should’ve been saying is, ‘fucking awesome,’ because it was, but I feel like ‘adequate’ doesn’t cut it.”

“For Quall, it’s a compliment,” Vax says.

“Right, but you said you didn’t think Quall gave compliments, which means you were talking about real compliments, not Quall-compliments.”

“I think you might be overcomplicating this,” Vax says.

Keyleth grins, ignoring both of them, stretching her arms and legs and feeling good about herself and dancing and her whole life. She sends Percy a quick, I’m so cool, text as she’s packing up, and at first when her phone starts buzzing, she thinks it’s him responding, but it keeps going, and she frowns, picking it up.

Dad, the light up display says baldly, and she presses her lips together, staring at it.

“Kiki?” Vax says, startling her. “Everything okay?”

“Huh? Oh—oh, yeah, it’s fine.” She looks up and smiles at him deliberately. “You two go on without me, okay? I’ll see you at home.”

“Are you sure, Keyleth?” Vex says. “It’s kind of late, it might be better to stick together.”

“Yeah, yeah,” she says quickly. “It’ll be fine. Excuse me.”

She practically runs away from them, hefting her things over her shoulder and ducking into a thankfully empty music practice room. It’s about ten square feet, but it’s quiet and she drops into a wobbly chair in front a music stand and answers her phone.

“Hi, Dad.”

“Hello, Princess,” he says, and she knows how much he loves her, so she really wishes she were happier to hear from him. “How are you?”

“I’m good, Dad. How’s the firm?”

“Going well. There’s still a spot open here for you, you know.”

She bites her lip. “Daddy, I haven’t even gone to law school.”

“Yet,” he says firmly. “No time like the present, you know.”

“I’m a little busy,” she says. “Daddy, things are going well, they really are. My director told me I was doing great today, and I really think this is going to be a good show for me.” That’s not quite what Quall said, but Vex and Vax are right, that was the subtext. She thinks. She’s very nearly sure, and telling her father Quall said she was ‘adequate’ would be…

“Well, that’s great, Keyleth,” he says. “I’m very happy for you.”

“Thanks, Dad,” she says, biting her lip. “I’m really happy about it too.”

“Good,” he says. “Do you think that means you’ll be getting a spot with a better company soon?”

And there it is. She closes her eyes and leans forward, resting her forehead on the cool metal of the music stand in front of her. The joint that lets people tilt it back and forth is stiff enough that it doesn’t even twitch under her weight, and it’s a relief to just put her weight against it and feel how cold and rough it is.

“I…I might, Daddy, yeah.”

“Everyone back at home is rooting for you,” he says. “And, you know, it’s good that you’re doing this. Some time as a professional ballerina will look great on your law school applications. It’ll show you know how to work hard and—”

“Yeah,” she says. “Thanks. I—Listen, I should go. I have an early call tomorrow, and I want to get a good night’s sleep.”

“Of course, Princess,” he says. “You get some sleep. I’ll come down to see your show, all right? I can’t wait to see how good you are.”

“Thanks,” she says. “That’ll be great. Good night.”

“Good night,” he says, and she listens to him hang up and the silence that follows, not moving.

It’s almost oppressively quiet and still in the building. It feels, somehow, like there might not be people or sounds for miles, like if she so much as moves, the shifting of her body would echo resoundingly.

She should get up, probably. She should go home and wake up early tomorrow and practice and practice and practice and never stop until opening night. She should tell Vex and Vax and Percy that she’s fine and avoid their sympathetic looks and attempts at assurances and get better.

She sits up, and instead of the sound echoing, it just feels muffled and dead, despite the impressive acoustics in each music practice room. The things are built like bathrooms and she still can’t seem to make any noise in this place.

She looks down at the phone still clutched in her hand, her fingertips making oily prints on the glass front, and she texts Kash.

I would like to get drunk and receive absolutely no sympathy.

It barely takes a full minute for it to buzz and light up in her hands, and when she looks down, it’s cheerfully telling her, You’ve definitely texted the right asshole for that. Yours, mine, or a bar?

Bar, she types out, after a moment’s thought. Meet you there.

Already on my way, ballerina. Save me a seat.

—

She beats him there, sliding awkwardly into a booth at the back, dumping her coat and bag next to her, and after a moment’s thought, ordering them each a Guinness. The beers get there before he does, so she’s already drinking by the time he slides in next to her, tossing his own coat across the table onto the other bench.

“Hey,” he says. He gestures at the other glass of beer. “That for me, or are you planning on chugging the one you’ve got and starting on the next?”

“That’s for you,” she says.

“Thanks.” He pulls it closer to himself and drinks. “I kind of thought you’d have broken out the tequila shots again, honestly.”

“I have rehearsal tomorrow,” she says. “I want to get drunk, but I…shouldn’t. But I needed something.”

“Okay,” he says. “I assume not wanting sympathy also means not wanting to talk about it.”

She looks down. “There isn’t really anything to talk about.”

He shifts a little closer, and their shoulders bump together. “That’s not the same thing as not wanting to talk about it, frankly.”

“There really isn’t anything to say,” she says. “I wouldn’t even know where to start.”

“Okay,” he says. “Z says Vex says you were pretty awesome in rehearsal.”

She tries to smile. “I was, yeah. It’s just—not enough.”

“Not enough to be awesome.”

“Not enough to be awesome here,” she snaps out. “Not enough if it’s not New York or London or Paris or Chicago or—it’s never good enough. It doesn’t matter how hard I’m trying or how good I was or anything at all, if I’m still stuck in this fucking nowhere company.”

“Huh.” He drinks deeply, getting a little of the thick foam on his upper lip before he wipes it off with the back of a large tan hand. “Talk to your dad recently?”

She closes her eyes and leans back onto the back of the seat. “Oh, go away.”

“Nah, you invited me, you’re stuck with me. Look,” he says, “success is bullshit, okay, and you need to stop being such a freak about it, and if that means not picking up when your dad calls, fine, works for me.”

“Success is bullshit,” she repeats dubiously. “I don’t think it is, actually.”

“No, it is,” he says. “Like. Your life objectively sucks, right?”

“Oh, wow, thanks.”

“Hey, you said you wanted absolutely no sympathy,” he says. “If you want someone comforting, I can call your roommates.”

“No,” she says, leaning her head to the side so it rests on his shoulder—which is very broad, she notices idly. “I don’t want people to be comforting. When people are comforting, I just feel like they’re placating me.”

“Uh,” Kash says, sounding odd. “Yeah, uh, me too.”

“So no sympathy,” she says. “Keep telling me how much my life sucks.”

“Objectively sucks,” he says. “Objectively.”

“Is it objectively sucking better than just normal sucking?” she says dubiously.

“I’m a big fan of normal sucking, actually,” he says with a smirk, and then he groans and puts his head in his hands. “Ah, fuck, sorry, that was bad timing, right?”

She surprises herself by laughing, pressing her fist against her mouth to try and muffle the sound, but he peeks around the side of his hands and grins at her. “Oh, yes, Kash,” she says. “Tell me more about how much you like sucking.”

“Well, Keyleth,” he says seriously. “Sucking is amazing. You should be glad that your life is sucking—or would licking be better, actually, for you—because believe me when I say that I wished my life sucked me.”

She collapses into giggles onto the table. “Could my life lick me? I don’t know if works that way.”

“I think it might in England,” he says. “Like—’give you a licking,’ like beat you up? That’s a thing, right?”

“Well, I know where I’m moving next,” she says. “I can’t wait for some licks.”

He laughs, shaking his head at her. “You know, ballerina, people think you’re all sweet, but you’ve got a dirty fucking mouth.”

“More about fucking mouths?” she says, grinning at him. “You know, I’m starting to think you’ve got a fixation.”

“Jesus,” he says. “That was amazing. I’ve been out-sex joked. What the fuck.”

She bows to an imaginary crowd of adoring fans. “Thank you, thank you, it was all down to my incredible ingenuity and being smarter than Kashaw.”

“Uh-huh,” he says. “You say that like it’s difficult.”

She blinks and looks over at him, frowning. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“What? It was just a joke.”

“Yes, but—Kash, you’re very smart,” she says. “Of course you’re smart.”

He rolls his eyes. “You barely even know me,” he says. “All you know is that I’m good at piano and probably cello. It’s okay, ballerina, you don’t need to make me feel better. I had to make my peace with all the terrible choices I make a long time ago.”

“But—”

“Seriously, Keyleth,” he says. “I don’t have to be smart.”

“Okay,” she says dubiously. “But—but I think you’re wonderful.” She nudges him lightly in the side. “Who else would work out I’m having a bad day and then tell me my life sucks and make blow job jokes about it?”

“You said you didn’t want sympathy!” he says. “I can be sympathetic. Uh.” He makes a face and very tentatively pats her shoulder. “There, there.”

She laughs helplessly. “Yes, that’s very good sympathy, well done.”

“Shut up,” he says, but he’s smiling. “Besides, I didn’t just mean that your life sucks, I had a whole point I was building to.”

“Right,” she says. “About my life objectively sucking.” She folds her hands in her lap and widens her eyes, giving him her best listening expression. “Yeah, I want to hear all about where you were planning to go with that.”

“I feel like you’re making fun of me.”

“See, I knew you were smart!”

“You’re so annoying,” he says, reaching out and tugging on her hair. “I meant to say, you can’t be objective about your own life, and you shouldn’t be. Your life objectively sucks, but do you want to quit and trade it in for an objectively successful life?”

“I—”

“Actually want, not whatever it is you think you should do.”

“...No,” she admits.

“Right. So, from your very biased perspective, your life is fine. And you should have bias, it’s your life and you have to live it. That’s what I meant.”

She stares at him. “That’s… I don’t know what to say.”

“Don’t say anything, just stop being stupid,” he says gruffly, and he takes a long gulp of beer, not looking at her.

She smiles, ducking her head. He’s got the arm closest to her draped over the back of their booth, and she tucks herself into his side, reaching out to grab her own beer. “Yeah, okay,” she says. “I’ll stop being stupid.”

“Yeah, do that,” he says, voice brusque, but after a moment, his arm comes down to drape over her shoulders, and he squeezes.

—

They practically rush towards opening night after that, reworking choreography the whole time, so that she still feels uncertain of some of the steps all the way up until she’s sitting in her dressing room, shaking as she stares at herself in the mirror and tries to get her makeup on.

“Hey,” Vex says, reaching over to grab her hand, a mascara wand trapped between two fingers and her face half done. “Breathe, Keyleth. It’ll be okay. You’ll be great.”

“It’ll be okay,” Keyleth repeats weakly. “I’ll be great.” She doesn’t believe it for a second.

Vex squeezes her hand. “Put the makeup down and take a couple deep breaths, okay? The last thing you need is to have to spend your time redoing your foundation because you smeared your eyeliner.”

“Yeah,” Keyleth says, immediately pressing her hands against the low counter they’re both sitting against, staring at the bright lights throwing her face into harsh relief. They’re extremely unforgiving, and she can pick out every single place she plucked her eyebrows even a little bit wrong this morning. Her lips are chapped, and she can see her nose hair. Before the thick foundation, all she could think about was every single pore on her nose and pimple at her hairline, breaking up her smooth complexion.

She pushes away quickly, standing up and crossing to the other side of the room. Vex is muttering behind her, and if she concentrates, she can pick out, “Glissade, glissade, glissade, grand jeté...”

Keyleth stops listening hurriedly, pressing her hands against her stomach and trying to breathe very deeply, or at all. Bending down to fumble through her things, she drags her phone out of her bag with numb fingers and resolutely continues to ignore the text from her father that says, Can’t wait to see your show tonight, Princess. Break a leg.

She opens up a game instead, trying to lose herself in the tranquil world of Candy Crush, but she can barely concentrate, and she gives up without even losing the level.

“Fuck,” she whispers and opens her messages instead, typing out a text quickly.

If I mess it all up tonight and ruin the entire show and break something important and can never dance ever again, you’ll still like me, right?

She regrets it almost as soon as she hits send. She sounds stupid and pitiful, and she’s fishing for compliments, and it’s ridiculous, and she hates herself.

It only takes a moment or two, though, before her phone buzzes in her hands, and she almost drops it.

What makes you think I like you now? Don’t be stupid.

She can practically hear him saying it, and she laughs despite herself, feeling some of the tension leach out of her shoulders. The phone vibrates again, and she looks down, smiling.

I won’t even be able to see you from the pit, so I won’t know if you suck, but break a leg, ballerina.

She grins and quickly writes, I don’t know how to pick the sound of a cello out of a lineup, so me neither, but you too. See you after?

After a short moment, she just gets back, Sure, and she slips her phone back into her bag and goes to sit down in front of the mirror.

Vex looks up and stops whispering her steps long enough to smile and say, “Feeling better?”

“A little,” Keyleth says. “Yeah.”

—

The second the curtain comes down and she realizes, faintly, that she did it, she slaps a hand over her mouth to stop a very unprofessional burst of giddy laughter. She smiles when the lights and the curtain come back up, and if it’s a little more manic than her stage smiles usually are, she doesn’t think anyone’s really going to be able to tell.

She practically floats through the curtain call, and as soon as they get backstage again, she throws herself onto Vex and Vax, who are already wrapped up in each other’s arms, but they open the hug for her gladly, and they clutch at each other, all talking.

“God, that was so—”

“And in the second act—”

“—and I thought you were going to drop me, but—”

“—when the music came up—”

“I swear, I almost—”

“—you got so high!”

“—and I really felt it—”

“We were so good!” Vex exclaims, grabbing both their shoulders tightly. “That was fucking awesome! I mean, it’s still a weird goddamn production of Giselle, but who even cares, because we kicked ass!”

“We did,” Vax says, and Keyleth laughs, letting her head fall back on her shoulders, looking up at the catwalks and the bright lights that Percy spent weeks on. Her costume itches, and her body is aching, and she’s never felt so good in her entire life.

“Okay,” Vex says. “We have the opening night reception thing, let’s go make nice with donors, hmm? Change, meet there, try not to seem too crazed with glee?”

“Anything you want, sister,” Vax says, grabbing her up and whirling her around and kissing her on the cheek. “God, you two were good.”

“We were,” Keyleth says exultantly, grabbing Vex’s sweaty hand. “That went well.”

Vex laughs. “No need to sound so surprised, darling. We’re all amazing, after all.”

“The most amazing,” Vax says. “Jesus. I think I’m about ninety percent adrenaline right now.”

“Great,” Vex says. “Hold on to that feeling, we have to go make nice with the people who pay our salaries.”

“Hey, if we’re nice enough, maybe they’ll pay us more.”

“That’s what I’m saying, yeah.” She grabs Keyleth’s hand and squeezes. “Okay, seriously—changing, going to the reception, being proper principal members of the ballet. We’ve got this. Brother, we’ll see you very soon, try to contain your feelings and keep from throwing yourself onto anyone else.”

Vax rolls his eyes. “Uh-huh, okay. Meet you once I’m not in tights anymore.”

Vex practically drags Keyleth back towards their dressing room, and Keyleth runs to keep up, still kind of giggling and a little punch-drunk.

“You brought a dress along, right?” Vex says cheerfully, as they fall through the door. “For the reception?”

“Of course!” Keyleth says. “And makeup remover and non-stage makeup. I’m not new.”

“Sorry to have offended,” Vex says, rolling her eyes, but she’s still grinning, and Keyleth doesn’t think either of them is likely to take much of anything seriously tonight. Which is probably a good thing, considering the reception they still have to get through.

“Here,” Keyleth says, holding up the dress bag she brought. “It’s green, that long velvet one?”

“Oh, good, that one’s hot,” Vex says, ignoring Keyleth when she blushes and stutters. “Come clean your face off, I want to do your makeup.”

“I could do my own makeup,” Keyleth says, but without feeling. Vex has always been better at that kind of thing anyway, and she doesn’t complain when, after she’s rubbed the cold cream on and off her face and put her dress on, Vex sits her down in a chair and scrutinizes her face.

“I think,” she proclaims, “that you should look sexy tonight.”

“Um,” Keyleth says.

“Nope!” Vex says happily. “I’ve decided. We’re both going to look fucking hot, and everyone is going to be ridiculously jealous of my brother as he squires us around, one on each arm. He needs something to make it look like he has any game at all, heaven knows.”

“Um,” Keyleth says again. “I feel like it’s not game if…you’re his sister?”

Vex waves a hand dismissively. “Details.”

Keyleth laughs. “Okay, sure. Make me look hot!”

“Excellent,” Vex says. “You spend a lot of time trying to look cute, I feel like, and you pull it off very well, but darling, you are absolutely smoking underneath the cat sweaters.”

“Thank…you…?” Keyleth says, feeling her face burn. “I feel like that’s a weird thing for you to say.”

“Why?” Vex says, frowning as she begins to apply eyeshadow. “I think a lot of girls are hot.”

“Yes, but… You’re you. And I’m me.”

“Right,” Vex says. “But I’m not interested in dating you, and you’re in love with Kashaw, so what’s a little flirtatious complimenting between friends?”

“I’m what?!” Keyleth shrieks, shooting up into a standing position.

“Oh, good, now I’ve smeared that everywhere.”

“I’m in—I’m in—I’m not!”

Vex snorts. “Are you sure, darling? Because you get this look, you know, when you’re texting him or going to meet him or just about anything, really. This smile. Vax and I call it ‘Kash face’ right now, but I’m sure we can come up with something snappier eventually.”

“You and Vax talk about this?”

“Vax and I talk about everything,” she says. “Sit down, would you? I have to clean that off, redo your foundation, and start all over again.”

“I’m not in love with Kash!”

“Okay, okay, you’re not,” Vex says. “Seriously, you look like glitter threw up on your eye, and it’s not attractive.”

Keyleth sits back down, hard. “I mean, he’s very handsome, but I don’t think about him like that. I don’t. He’s just nice. We like spending time together. And sure, he’s—he looks very nice. I mean. He does, that’s just, like. Anyone would notice that he looks nice. He has nice hands. They’re very big, and they look—and very broad shoulders. And a good face.”

“Uh-huh,” Vex says, wiping the eyeshadow off carefully and starting to reapply foundation where she had to use the makeup remover.

“But I don’t have a Kash face, because that’s ridiculous! I’m just happy. To hang out with my friend. Who’s very handsome—”

“Not that you’ve noticed,” Vex mutters.

“But who I don’t think about like that,” Keyleth says, her voice going very high pitched. “Because it would be weird! And wrong!”

“Uh-huh,” Vex says. “Close your eyes. And stop shouting, it makes your face move too much. There’s a difference between ‘hot’ and ‘hot mess,’ and I’m not going to have you ruin my hard work.”

Keyleth closes her eyes obediently, but she can’t stop herself from opening her mouth to say, “I don’t know where you even got the idea that—”

“Keyleth, seriously, unless you can talk without moving your face, shut up,” Vex says. “I get it. How could I ever have erroneously thought that you spend a lot of time thinking about how nice to look at Kashaw is.”

“I don’t.”

“Yes, that’s what I’ve absolutely gotten out of this conversation. Now, hold still, I need to do your eyeliner.”

Keyleth subsides, pressing her lips together to try and keep the hundreds of other very good reasons for why she could never, ever have feelings for Kash from tumbling out. Definitely hundreds. Probably once she started saying them she couldn’t stop.

Not that he isn’t great.

Fuck, she hates Vex.

“Okay, purse your lips,” Vex says, apparently unaware of the mental vitriol being directed towards her. “Your eyes have enough makeup that adding a dark color on your lips would be a little too much, but… Ah, here’s some lip gloss, that’ll look lovely. Do you have a clutch?”

Keyleth waits patiently for Vex to remove the lip gloss wand from her lips, and then she says, “Yes.” She presses her newly slick lips together, and Vex actually tuts at her.

“Don’t do that, you’ll just push it around and get it all around your mouth,” she says. She holds the lip gloss out and says, “I’m guessing there’ll be champagne, so put that in your clutch and reapply as needed, okay?”

“Okay,” Keyleth says, shrugging and popping it into her little gold bag. “Wouldn’t it just be easier to not be wearing it, in that case?”

“But it looks so pretty,” Vex says. “There, see? You’re gorgeous.”

Keyleth turns to look at herself in the mirror and smiles. She does look good, with her dark, dramatic eyes and the hint of a shine on her mouth. “Wow, thanks, Vex. I look amazing.”

“Of course you do,” Vex says smugly. “I was directly involved.”

Keyleth laughs. “You’ve been spending too much time with Scanlan.”

“Any time with Scanlan is too much time with Scanlan,” Vex says, turning to the mirror to start work on her own face. “But I don’t need to hang out with the king of narcissism to know I’m amazing.”

“Sure,” Keyleth says, crossing the room to get her heels and her phone. There’s a missed message from Percy that just says, Break a leg, and she smiles and sends back, I did, thanks!

She slips it into her clutch with the lip gloss and begins the arduous process of strapping her gold stiletto sandals on over her already aching and overworked feet, because somehow she ended up in a profession that requires her to be completely beautiful and graceful at all times, no matter how her body feels about it.

“We’re going to knock them dead,” Vex says, sounding pleased, and Keyleth glances up from wrestling with a tiny buckle to see her strike a pose in the mirror.

“You look so beautiful, Vex!”

“Thanks,” she says. “We spend so much time in work-out clothes and ridiculous costumes that I love getting to look good whenever I can.”

“You always look good,” Keyleth says, and Vex grins at her.

“Of course I do, I—” A knock on the door interrupts her, and they both turn to look at it. “Who’s that?” Vex says, frowning.

Keyleth shrugs, trying to finish fastening her shoes. “Vax?”

“Please, Vax would just come in,” Vex says, going to the door and opening it. “Oh. Yeah, this one’s for you.”

“Huh?” Keyleth says, looking up as she finally gets her shoes on.

“Uh, hi,” Kash says, standing in the doorway. He’s wearing a tux.

“Hi,” she says, swallowing to try and get some moisture into her suddenly dry mouth.

“And that’s my cue,” Vex says, grabbing a pair of terrifyingly tall black heels from the side of the room and a clutch of her own. “Keyleth, darling, see you at the party! Nice to see you again, Kash.”

“Yeah, uh, you too,” Kash says, but she’s already blown past him into the hallway. He looks back at Keyleth. “I forgot you guys had to go to that opening night thing.”

“Yeah, for the donors,” Keyleth says, standing up.

Kash stares at her. “Fuck.”

“Is everything okay?” she says, grabbing her clutch and moving closer to him. She can’t help noticing that the tux doesn’t fit him incredibly well, but somehow it looks amazing anyway, which is absurd.

“Yeah,” he says quickly. “You just—uh. I mean. I heard you didn’t suck.”

“What?” she says. “Oh. Yeah, I didn’t. I mean, I was really good.”

“That’s…good,” he says. “I’m glad to hear it.”

“Yeah,” she says. “Yeah, me too.”

His lips quirk up at the corner. “You’re glad to hear it?”

She punches him in the shoulder, relieved that he’s gone back to being a little bit of an asshole. “I was glad to do it.”

“Oh, okay, good,” he says. “I was worried you’d had to hear secondhand how not terrible you were, and then I’d just be really worried about your perception, honestly.”

“Shut up,” she says cheerfully.

“Yeah, okay,” he says. “Anyway. I just wanted to tell you congratulations on not sucking, or whatever. I guess you won’t need me to play piano for you anymore.”

“Oh!” she says. “Oh, well—I guess not. But we’ll still hang out, right?”

He rolls his eyes. “Yeah, ballerina, we’ll still hang out.”

“Oh,” she says, stupidly relieved. “Well, good.”

“Yeah, good,” he says. “So—so I should let you get to your party, huh. I mean, I should go. And let you go celebrate.”

She laughs. “It’s work, not a proper celebration. I have to go make nice with people who give the company money.”

“Sounds thrilling,” he says. “Well, they’ll totally give you more money. You look, uh, really good. I mean. Beautiful. Drop dead gorgeous. Whatever.”

She feels herself blush, and hard. “Thank you,” she says, or she tries to say it, but it comes out kind of squeaky. “Um, so do you. I mean, you look very nice. In your tux. Not that you don’t look nice all the time. Not that I’ve noticed you looking nice, or anything!”

“Uh. Yeah, okay, fuck it,” he says, and then he kisses her.

She’s too stupefied to do much more than stand there, so she mostly just gapes at him when he pulls back, his hand gentle on her chin and his face unreadable.

“Yeah, well, see you around,” he says, and he’s out the door by the time she gets her bearings enough to even realize that she should react.

“Oh my god,” she says to the empty air. “Oh my god!” She moves all at once, practically tripping over her high heels in her rush to pull the door back open and try to figure out where he went. She steps on her hem on her way out and has to catch herself on the wall, shaking her skirts out as she looks from side to side.

“Keyleth!” Vex says, running up to her.

“Vex! Did you see Kash? Did you pass him?”

“What?” says Vex. “Who cares about Kash? There’s a guy here Vax knows, and he works for the Joffrey. Come on, hurry up, you have to meet him!”

“But—wait, really the Joffrey? The actual Joffrey?”

Vex grabs her by the shoulders and shakes her. “What other Joffreys are there? Come on.”

“Yeah,” Keyleth says, casting one last glance down the hall Kash must have disappeared down. “God, yeah, let’s go.”

—

After the party, they meet Percy, who’s leaning idly against Vex’s beat up, piece of shit car that she never drives but loves desperately anyway. They only ever use it when one of them has time to drop the others off or pick them up, so that they don’t have to pay for parking, but it’s always a relief after a long day to collapse into the back seat with Percy as Vex and Vax get in the front.

“Show go well?” Percy says, putting an arm around her shoulders.

She leans into him gratefully. “Very well. Plus, after—oh, god, I forgot!” She sits bolt upright, and the twins turn their heads to look at her in tandem.

“Forgot what?” Vax says.

“Kash kissed me!” she says. “Oh my god, Kash kissed me. Kissed me. With his mouth!”

“Well, I’m certainly glad he didn’t do it with anything else,” Percy says dryly.

“He kissed you? Really?” Vex says. “I didn’t think he had the balls.”

“He absolutely kissed me,” Keyleth says. “He told me I looked beautiful, and then he kissed me, and then he...left.”

“Oh, there it is,” Vex says. “I knew he didn’t have the balls.”

“He has plenty of—nope, not finishing that sentence,” Keyleth says.

“Good choice,” Percy says.

“But he kissed me!” she says. “Actually kissed me. And then he left, and—and—what does that mean?”

“Oh, for the love of—” Vex blows out an annoyed breath. “It means he’s got an absolutely massive thing for you, but he’s too much of a dipshit to tell you with his words.”

“He has a thing for me?” Keyleth says, looking at Vax and Percy, who both nod at her with some amusement. “He has a thing for me.” There’s something warm and stupid building in her stomach, and she can feel her cheeks heat up as the smile grows on her face. Her fingers are tingling, and she presses them together to try and keep them still. “Oh my god, Kash likes me.”

“This is all very third grade, somehow,” Vex comments from the front seat, though Keyleth is barely paying attention.

“Shut up, I think it’s sweet,” Vax says.

“You would.”

Keyleth looks at Percy. “I think I might have a crush on Kash?”

Percy pats her arm. “Well, it’s good you’ve realized.”

“Did you know?”

“Keyleth, darling, we all knew,” Vex says briskly. “The real question now is, what are you going to do about it?”

“I could…call him?” she says tentatively.

“You’re going to declare your undying love over the phone?” Vax says skeptically.

“It’s not love!” she protests. “It’s a crush.”

“Sure, but undying love is so much more fun to say,” Percy says. “And he’s right, it’s not exactly romantic. Where does he live?”

“With Zahra,” Vex says immediately. “I know where that is.”

“What do you say, Kiki?” Vax says, grinning at her. “Feel up for a grand, romantic gesture?”

—

Keyleth’s hand shakes a little as she presses the buzzer for Kash and Zahra’s apartment, but she clenches it into a fist and reminds herself that he’d kissed her. So he definitely likes her, he must—

“Hello?” a woman’s voice says through the tinny speakers, and she has a moment of heart-stopping disappointment before she remembers it’s definitely Zahra.

“It’s Keyleth,” she says.

“Oh, Keyleth,” Zahra says. “I hope you’re looking for Kashaw.”

“I am, yeah.”

“Oh, good, he’s been absolutely unbearable. Our place is a disaster, but I’ll send him down.”

“Thanks,” she says, stepping back from the doorway and glancing back to the car, where Vex gives her a thumbs up as Percy puts his head in hands. She tries to shoo them away, but Vex just looks pointedly out the other window and pretends not to see.

Vax makes an apologetic face at her through the car window and pokes his sister, which achieves absolutely nothing but creating a sibling slap fight, with Percy shaking his head at both of them.

“Hey,” a voice says behind her, and she whirls around to see Kash coming out the door. He makes a face at the car and shoves his hands into his pockets. He’s wearing jeans and a t-shirt again, but he still looks good, and god, she likes him. “What’s up?”

“Hi,” she says, and then she completely stalls out.

When the silence finally stretches from awkward to actually painful, he says, “So…?”

“Um,” she says. “Um, I—oh, god, I might be moving to Chicago. I might be moving to Chicago, because Vax knows a guy who works for the Joffrey, and he came to see the show tonight, and he thought we were awesome—and I might be moving to Chicago.”

He stares at her. “Oh. That’s—okay.”

“Wait, that’s not what I meant to say.”

“It isn’t,” he says flatly.

“No, no, I meant to say—you should move to Chicago too. With me, I mean. Or not with me-with me, because that would be crazy, because we aren’t even dating yet, so that would just be—I mean. That’s ridiculous.”

“Hold on,” he says. “We aren’t dating yet?”

“Oh.” She feels herself blush, and she waves one of her hands in the air in a slightly frantic, meaningless pattern. “I like you? That was the other thing. The real thing, I mean, that I came here to say. I, um. You’re great.”

“Uh-huh,” he says, but he’s starting to smile.

“I mean, obviously I like you,” she continues to babble. “That’s—duh, right? I meant, you know, that I like-like you. With the kissing and all.”

“You like-like me?” he says, and he’s definitely full-on grinning now. “Come on, ballerina, what is this, the third grade?”

“Shut up,” she says, punching him in the arm. “I am trying to tell you—”

“Yeah, I think I got it,” he says, and then he kisses her again.

It’s better this time, because she manages to get it together enough to wrap her arms around his neck and try to kiss back, though she might be terrible at it, because it’s not like she has much experience—so it’s a little awkward, and a little messy, and she thinks they’re probably going to have to practice a lot, which sends a thrill up her spine, because practicing means more of this. And besides, they’re pretty good at practicing together, all things considered.

When they stop, she realizes with faint horror that there is cheering coming from the car behind her—and from above her, actually, and she looks up to see Zahra Hydris leaning out of a second story window, clapping.

“For the love of—” Kash says. “Why are all our friends so embarrassing. Z, cut it out!”

“I’m very happy for you, darling,” Zahra calls back. “And I’ve cleaned a bit, so feel free to invite Keyleth upstairs.”

“Oh my god,” Keyleth whispers, hiding her face with one hand.

“Sorry about her,” Kash says quietly. “Hey, when are you maybe moving to Chicago?”

“Oh, um—I have a contract right now, so not for a few months, I guess? And I might not be! There would be, like, audition stuff, and I would have to do well on that, and it wouldn’t be as a principal or anything, but the Joffrey does all these short programs, and I could probably get featured?”

“Which would be amazing, yeah,” Kash says. “Okay. How about we, uh, you know. Date. For a few months, while your contract expires, and then at the end of that, maybe we talk about me moving to Chicago? If it’s working out?”

She stares at him, feeling the ridiculous smile stretching over her face. “Really?”

“Yeah, sure. Oh, uh, wait, maybe. Hey, Z, how do you feel about Chicago?”

“I think I could be persuaded to enjoy it,” Zahra says. “My, you two move fast.”

“Shut up,” Kash says. To Keyleth, he adds, “Worst comes to worst, we talk long distance for a little while. The awesomeness of your professional career is not a deal breaker here.”

“Great,” she says, beaming at him. “So, we’re, um—dating now?”

“Yeah, that seems to be the consensus here,” he says. “Uh, do you want to come up? Not for—I mean, you know. But if you wanted to kiss somewhere where our friends can’t see us and be jerks?”

“Yeah,” she says. “Um, yeah, that could be—nice. Oh, but I have to call my father. Can I do that first? Before the kissing, I mean.”

“Sure. Wasn’t he coming to see the show?”

“Yeah, but he knew I’d be tired afterwards, what with the reception, so he said he’d take me out for brunch tomorrow. But I should call him anyway.”

“Sure,” Kash says. “What are you going to tell him?”

“Well,” she says, grinning at him. “I thought to start with, I’d tell him that I’m not going to law school for an incredibly long time.”

“Yeah?” he says, tucking a piece of hair behind her ear. She shivers. “Good plan.”

Epilogue—

“I can’t believe you got off at the wrong train station again,” Kash says, his voice slightly muffled through her phone speakers. He must have tucked it between his cheek and shoulder badly again, and she smiles.

“Look,” she says. “Berwyn and Bryn Mawr are right next to each other, and they sound incredibly similar.”

“They both start with B,” he says. “What else?”

“They’ve both got random Ys somewhere awkward? I feel like they’re both Welsh, or something.”

“Damn the Welsh, is that what you’re saying?” Kash says, sounding amused.

“Sure, that’s definitely the point of this phone call. Anyway, we live between the two, so it’s not like it’s that long of a walk if I do get off at the wrong stop.”

“That’s a good reason to keep doing it, yeah,” he says, and she blows a raspberry into the phone.

“I’m not doing it on purpose,” she says. “When are you coming to visit? Then I can watch you mess up on public transportation. I can’t wait, honestly.”

“Too bad, because I’m not going to mess it up, because when my phone tells me to get off at Berwyn, I pay attention. You might want to try that, ballerina.”

“You know I have my own room in this apartment, right?” she says, ignoring him. “Three whole bedrooms in this place. Vex and Vax are still sharing, but Percy and I both finally have some privacy.”

“Hey, first chance I get,” he says. “You don’t have to bribe with a whole bedroom to ourselves in the apartment you still share with three other people. And I’ve got some job interviews there in a couple weeks, anyway.”

“Really?” she says, actually skipping for a few steps down the sidewalk. She waves cheerfully at the woman passing her, who gives her a funny look.

“Yeah,” he says. “Just teaching, but that’s not so bad. Next stop, CSO, right?”

“Right,” she says eagerly. “And Chicago’s got a bunch of theater, so there’s got to be pit opportunities too, and—”

“Hey, try to contain yourself,” he says. “I was joking about the CSO.”

“I wasn’t,” she says. Before he can say something self-deprecating, she adds, “Oh, hey, my dad wants to meet you.”

“Oh, good.”

“You know, somehow I’m getting the impression you aren’t looking forward to that,” she says, turning the corner.

“Wow, you’re so perceptive.”

“My dad’ll love you!” she protests.

“Oh, yeah, he’s gonna adore the bohemian itinerant musician who doesn’t cut his hair and deflowered his little girl. That’s going to go over incredibly well.”

“You’re not itinerant.”

“Your dad’s a lawyer,” Kash says. “In comparison, I probably am.”

“My father is a hippie who works for an environmental non-profit,” she says. “He’s not exactly raking it in. And anyway, you’re a good fit for his bohemian itinerant dancer daughter who also doesn’t cut her hair.”

He just grunts, and she laughs.

“Kash!” she says. “Stop being such a grump. Everything’s going to be just fine.”