chapter 13

Around eleven p.m.a woman with a tablet appeared in the door to the Reed-Whitmer Ballet Company’s greenroom. Lillian set down her sketchbook, where she’d been drawing on and off throughout the day. She’d been working on a sequence of drawings showing a relevé moving into an attitude turn. It would be so easy to “write” choreography with a series of animated videos. The choreographer could select different moves, transitions, and speeds and then share the sequence with her dancers. The app could save Lillian hours writing in Benesh and then translating the notes for her dancers. She’d never do anything with her app idea. She’d never have the time. But it was a good idea, and, just for once, she needed distraction.

She shouldn’t be nervous. The modern dance troupe, Retroactive Silence, had come in several points lower than the Reed-Whitmer Ballet Company. They were safe. But Velveteen Crush was going last. The audience would vote them off even if they were good. Everyone knew the last interviewee never got the job, the last dancer never won the audition. There was research. Something about attention fatigue. And the studio audience looked beyond fatigued. One woman had passed out. They would hate the last act. God could descend onstage on a cloud, and they’d still be thinking, When are we getting out of here?

“You’re free to go,” the woman who’d appeared at the door said. “It’s been a long day. Call is at six tomorrow for candids, team interactions, and anything we need to reshoot from last night. Costume got your outfits, yes?”

As soon as they’d finished their post-performance interviews, a trio of women had whisked their outfits away on a luggage cart, explaining that if they needed to reshoot anything, the outfits had to match yesterday exactly. Sweat stains and all, one woman had explained. We photograph them and use water to re-create the stains if we need to reshoot.

Lillian’s eyes flew to the TV screen, which was broadcasting shots of the crew setting up for Velveteen Crush’s act. The woman read her mind.

“We’ll show you some clips if you need to talk about them in the candids, or Bryant can just give you the lines. We’d like you to say something like—” The woman scrolled through something on her tablet. “—I appreciate their effort, but I don’t know how an amateur group really thought they’d compete with professionals. In your own words, of course. Going for snotty but not bitchy. And Bryant expects they’ll get cut tonight, so we don’t need to focus on them. So you guys can go.”

Imani said, “We out.”

Pascale said, “I need to call my kids.”

Lillian opened her mouth to tell the dancers it was important to watch all the competitors. On the screen she caught a shot of Blue high-fiving some of the crew, her smile magnetic, her curves luscious. Lillian could watch Velveteen Crush’s performance alone.

“Get some rest,” Lillian said to her dancers.

She heard Elijah whisper, “Isn’t rest where talent goes to die?” as he sashayed out of the room.

“You too,” Lillian said to Kia, who had been happily working on her laptop, finalizing a marketing plan for a second food truck. She worked as hard as Lillian. At least she’d been as successful in the world of hipster street food as Lillian was in ballet. But Kia still had time for yachting with her father and taking weeks off to eavesdrop on the backstage workings of The Great American Talent Show.

Kia kissed the top of Lillian’s head.

“I’ll leave you alone to watch your burlesque babe.”

“She’s not my—”

Kia had already bounced out of the room.

And on the screen, Velveteen Crush was starting, and they were… not entirely awful.

The troupe did a kind of cancan with little cameos where each of the performers stepped forward and performed a solo. The drag queen sashayed. The man who’d looked like a presidential aide in his street clothes tap-danced while thrusting his hips and rubbing his chest. The red-haired woman made every part of her body jiggle. The lights in the Star Maker column plummeted. The center of the column flashed Velveteen Crush’s dropping score. One point below Retroactive Silence. Now two points. Three.

And that was it; Velveteen Crush would come in dead last. Disappointment hit Lillian harder than she expected. She really wouldn’t see Blue again. A hot, sad longing filled her body. She would never make Blue melt. And Lillian needed to. It wasn’t just attraction. She wanted to tease Blue until she lost control and cried out in pleasure and Lillian saw the person behind the mask. She wanted to see Blue’s cocky smile softened by the afterglow of a long, sensuous orgasm. She wanted to make Blue feel so good the hint of sadness left her eyes. And Lillian wouldn’t, because the woman in the goth outfit was crawling around on the floor like a murderous, slow-motion cat. The Star Maker plunged.

That was for the best. This feeling was the kind of baseless crush she’d felt as a young teen when some girl caught her fancy and she’d dream up scenarios where they kissed and took road trips, and Eleanor would scold her for being distracted during rehearsals. She must be tired. It must be from sitting in a windowless room for twelve-plus hours waiting for nothing.

Except this.

Blue stepped forward. She wore the orange suit, but in the lights, it looked like fire, not fabric. She looked out at the audience as though she hadn’t expected them to be there. Then she winked, and her wink said, I know exactly what I’m doing, and I’m taking you with me.

“Burlesque is a place in the margins.” Blue must have been miked, because her voice resonated through the TV screen. “A place where we can explore what arouses us, what frightens us, a place where we can let go of shame.”

The audience cheered with the mania of people who knew they could escape if they could just scream through one more act. Izzy pressed her fingertips to her lips and blew the audience a kiss. A tingle ran through Lillian’s body. The Star Maker rose a point. A song Lillian didn’t recognize played in the background.

“Have you ever felt as though you weren’t enough?” Blue held her arms out. She timed her words to hang in the air when the song grew quiet. Then the song soared, and she raised her voice.

The Star Maker rose.

Blue slipped out of her jacket, carrying it casually over one shoulder.

“Not thin enough?” Her corset accented every sumptuous curve. “Not straight enough?” She blew a kiss to Sarah.

Jealousy stung Lillian like static electricity. Harmless. Fleeting. More an illusion than a feeling. Blue and Sarah weren’t… were they? What was Lillian thinking? She didn’t care.

“Not rich enough?” Blue strode across the stage, confident like she was strolling into a woman’s bedroom. “You are enough. You fill the whole sky. The Milky Way is holding open its arms for you.” She tossed her suit coat offstage and kept talking. Was it spoken word or a speech?

The applause died down because the audience was listening. The Star Maker hit eighty. How long was Blue’s piece? Could she possibly pull up their score? The Reed-Whitmer Ballet Company had scored ninety-seven. The lowest score had been ninety-one, the highest ninety-nine.

The way Blue had smiled when Lillian had joked about the competitive things they were supposed to say to each other, so happy that Lillian was playing along, had been so charming. Not ruthlessly sexy like the woman onstage but cute, even a tiny bit shy. And tonight the Star Maker would destroy whatever dreams Blue had for the show, as it should. Velveteen Crush was the worst team, and mediocrity should fail. But please… a voice in the back of Lillian’s mind whispered. Give them one more week.

Eighty-four.

Blue strode to the edge of the stage, turned her back, and slowly stroked her hands down her sides. The song’s backbeat held her message in its heartbeat. She was going to take off her corset. No, the show wouldn’t let her. Too risqué.

“It’s okay to want things.” Blue looked over her shoulder at the audience. “I want you.”

She dropped her corset. The audience gasped. Somehow she wasn’t topless but covered in a shimmering haze of fabric, as though she’d manifested a cloud of tulle.

“Did you think I’d give you the world?” Blue winked.

Velveteen Crush was bad, but Blue had taken charm to prima levels. The camera zoomed in on her face. The way her lips pulled up in a half smile, the way she commanded the camera’s attention, it felt like she touched the deepest part of Lillian’s heart, the rough, complicated chambers Lillian locked away, even from herself. Blue must be making the whole audience feel the same because the Star Maker edged up.

“We are here for one night. We. Are. Here. We breathe together.” It was the kind of thing a yoga instructor said, but Blue said it like the words unlocked human connection. “And for everyone watching out there in America, you are my heart.”

Eighty-seven.

“A gold thread ties us together.”

Ninety-two.

Ninety-eight.

The song was ending.

Ninety-nine.

“So pure a gold.” Blue’s voice wasn’t loud as much as it was huge. It melded with the last beat. She turned her back to the audience, swept her arms open, and everything she wore fell to the ground, replaced by a silky white robe. How did she do it? Someone must have turned on a fan, because it billowed around her, as large as a sail and as light as air. The song ended. The lights went off except for a single spotlight on Blue.

She was radiant.

“And Velveteen Crush comes in first with one hundred percent,” Hallie sang out. “Congratulations, Velveteen Crush.”