chapter 7

On the firstday of filming, a man assigned to be the company’s runner collected Lillian and then Imani, Jonathan, Elijah, Pascale, and Malik from their rooms at the Lynnwood Terrace apartments, where they would stay for however long they stayed on the show. It seemed like a waste for the first team to get voted off. They’d just have moved in. Then the show would pack up their stuff and whisk them to the airport. You didn’t get to stick around after the judges and the studio audience voted you off.

Lillian had negotiated her own studio apartment. A runner collected Lillian from her apartment then led her to the hallways where the other dancers shared two three-bedroom units. When Lillian and the runner arrived, the dancers were all together in the men’s apartment. Elijah and Imani were watching performance videos, their heads bent together over a laptop like generals strategizing how they’d take down the opposition. Pascale was on the phone with her kids, looking teary like she always did when she talked to them. Jonathan stretched, as solid and as tall as a tree. Only Malik looked completely at peace, crocheting a sweater. His grandmother raised him, and this was one of her talents. They got up and followed the runner.

“We’ll bus you to the venue,” the runner said, leading them through the halls of the apartment. “Then it’s a casual get-together with the other teams.”

A few minutes later, they got out of the van. The show had staged the get-together in the grand ballroom of a vintage hotel. The wooden floor had a peculiar give to it, as though they were walking on a mattress, perhaps a 1920s sprung floor. Large windows looked down on the street.

The producer greeted them at the door. Lillian remembered him, Bryant Walker. He hadn’t talked to them during the audition, but he’d been around checking his tablet and talking into a headset. The technology had looked odd on him since the rest of his outfit—cargo shorts, hiking boots, and a shirt with a vent in the back—said, I’m going camping. Maybe that was Oregon style.

“There’ll be cameras, but we’re just getting candid footage for the socials. We’ll start getting that behind-the-scenes content up soon. It’s the meta show. The show behind the show. If you can get them hooked on that, they’ll all watch on prime time. See if you can build some rivalries, tensions.” Bryant checked his tablet.

Some of the other contestants had already arrived. People milled around a bar at one end. The dancers in the Reed-Whitmer Ballet Company lined up beside Lillian, their hands at their sides: Jonathan, Malik, Elijah, Imani, Pascale. Each of them a hundred times more talented than The Great American Talent Show deserved. Pascale bounced nervously on her toes. Lillian shot her a look and she stopped. Kia finished up the line, allowed in with her magical influencer badge.

“Pretend we’re not here,” Bryant went on. “Just mingle. Have some food.” He gestured to a long table by the two-story windows where caterers were setting up. “The bar is open. Fizz Bang soda is the official soft drink of the show, so the bartender will be serving everything in Fizz Bang cans. We have a carefully curated selection of fans. We want to see you interacting with the people. Get comfortable.”

There were sofas and bistro tables set up in the front half of the large space. Men with cameras paced around checking angles and lighting. On the other side of the hall, another producer with a tablet was chatting to a group of Black men in matching streetwear.

“That’s Effectz,” Kia said. “Hip-hop dance. I was talking to one of the guys. Their stuff sounds dope.”

“When were you talking to one of the guys? We haven’t even met them.”

Kia tucked her hands in the pockets of her colorful overalls.

“You haven’t met them because you’ve been sitting in your apartment since we got here. Let’s go have fun,” she said to the dancers.

Jonathan and Malik looked at Lillian for permission. Pascale smoothed her hair although it was already straight and plastered to her head with gel. Elijah took Imani’s hand and swung their arms.

“I’ve got this,” Elijah said with a flick of his wrist. “Where are the boys? Wingman?” He looked at Imani.

“Always,” she agreed.

Elijah never dated. As far as Lillian knew, he never even hooked up. The constant search for beautiful men was a joke. He was a dancer. Only a dancer. There was no room for distraction. Elijah and Imani bounded off. Lillian nodded to the other dancers to excuse them. Kia followed them, all of them laughing and talking at once.

Lillian wandered over to the windows and looked down on Portland’s gay district. The street should have looked cheerful, but the rain drowned everything in gray. The rainbow crosswalks looked faded. A few determined smokers hung around outside the bar across the street.

Should she have told the dancers that this might be their last season together? It would add too much pressure. But dancers could handle pressure. She owed it to them. But now? If she was going to tell them, she should have told them the day Thomas Reed and Charles Whitmer talked to her. If they knew they’d be on their own soon though, they should be auditioning for other companies. Except the show contract forbade them from contacting any other companies or performance venues until after the first episode aired. So what was the point in stressing them out?

On the street, directly below the window, a group of people in colorful outfits and hair in a range of colors from bright orange to dark blue came into view. Even looking down on the tops of their heads, Lillian could tell they were having fun, jostling each other and high-fiving.

Blue hair.

Lillian’s mind flashed back to the last time she was in Portland. Maybe she could find time to get back to the Neptune for a drink. She’d go during the day when the bar was empty. She’d dispel the magic of that night. She’d remove the Instagram filter that cast a glow on those memories and see the place for what it was. A dive bar where she’d met a nice hookup.

“Hey, girl.” Kia’s voice startled Lillian. “Why you staring out the window all ‘Les Mis dying in the attic’?”

Kia looked out the window.

“The guy from Effectz says there’s someone downstairs signing women’s breasts.”

It was the colorful group Lillian had spotted coming down the street. And, yes, a woman was baring the top of her cleavage so the person with the blue hair could do something that looked very much like signing a name. Another woman queued up behind the first one, T-shirt pulled down.

“Please tell me that’s not the competition.”

“The burlesque group.”

“We rehearsed for twelve hours yesterday,” Lillian grumbled, more to the unfairness of the universe than to Kia. “And we’re up against some dude who signs women’s breasts.”

“Chick.”

“That doesn’t make it better.”

“It’s not even staged. The guy from Effectz said a bunch of fans caught her on the street. I don’t know why the show didn’t stop her. Maybe the producers were all up here.” Kia craned her neck. “Blue hair. Must be a Portland thing. That chick you hooked up with last time we were here, she had blue hair.”

“I don’t remember.”

The breast signer disappeared from view. Lillian leaned her arms on the windowsill and rested her chin on her hands in a pose Eleanor would have called undignified and casual. The sound of voices got louder. Someone turned on music. She was vaguely aware of cameras moving past her, probably identifying her as the standoffish one.

“Aw shit, of course you remember,” Kia said. “When I asked you how your night was, you said, Nice. Usually they’re just acceptable.”

“I’ve never said that.” Had she?

“Girl,” Kia strung the word out. “You told me you danced with her.”

“I’m a dancer.”

“Not like that. You liked her.”

“Maybe you’re right.”

“I’m right.” Kia bobbed her head back and forth, her Afro puffs bouncing. “I’m going to hit the bar. Try not to stress over here.” She headed off, but she was back in a second, no drink in hand, her expression so smug it verged on evil.

“What?” Lillian asked.

“You don’t even know. My dad is going to love this. Fate. Serendipity. Language of love. This is too good.”

Whatever it was, it probably wasn’t good.

“I’m dying to know.” She wasn’t.

“Take a look.” Kia put her hands on Lillian’s shoulders, turning her to face the party behind her.

Lillian looked.

“What?”

“Guess who’s here.”

“Who?”

“Blue hair over there.”

“Yeah. You said she was one of the burlesque group.”

The performer’s back was turned toward them, but even from behind the woman exuded confidence. She wore a dark blue suit that matched her hair and glistened like an oil slick. Was she taking out a pen to sign another fan’s breasts? Where were the producers to stop that tackiness? Maybe the show would cast her as the over-the-top one. They’d probably demand a rivalry between stuffy ballet and… whatever that display was.

Kia looked from Lillian to the performer and back. Her face said, Gotcha.

“I get it,” Lillian said. “That’s who we’re up against. Thank you for reminding me.”

Then the performer turned in their direction, and Lillian’s life got so much more complicated.