“Yes! Actually…” I flip back two pages in my notes and find the point I want to emphasize. “Next time, Danica, don’t start walking away until Adina says, ‘It’s enough pressure having a whole kingdom depend on me, without having to worry about you, too.’ I don’t want there to ever be too much physical space between you two. It’s a big stage.”

“But also, like, some physical space. You’re sisters,” Henry reiterates. “Cool it with the arm touching.”

Danica and Fitz process the notes and ask a few questions, and we take it again from the top. This time, Danica keeps her feet firmly rooted in place, while Fitz is pure motion. The emotion in Fitz’s performance is riveting—and when Danica as Emma, the younger sibling who tries so hard, has had enough, she pivots on her toes.

“Then don’t,” Danica says.

She holds the position for an extra beat and the energy in the room shifts. I swallow the lump in my throat and close my eyes to prevent any visible Emotions from happening. I’m not ready to let go of this feeling, of this show, of these people. Melted is small. HAVE A HE(ART) and the message we’re sending to the school committee makes it bigger. Maybe we’ll get a feature in the local paper—but it won’t receive national accolades for the school the way that the band does.

So maybe I’m naive to believe in this.

But when Danica turns her back on Fitz and walks away, away, away—it is a performance that is worthy of a stage, of an audience to be single-tear-sliding-down-their-cheeks moved. It is devastating and perfect and something that we, students with our backs against a wall, created from nothing.

And that matters too.

End scene.

Hours after we perfect the coronation scene—and no, I am still not over it, not at all—I am working on a lab report for AP Bio because, unfortunately, homework is very much still a thing. Writing about plant pigments and photosynthesis is as inspiring as it sounds. It’s difficult to shift my brain back to science after an afternoon in my happy place.

An unexpected knock on my doorframe makes me jump.

“You’re up late.”

I look up from homework, toward the threshold of my room and my father’s voice.

“The AP grind never stops.” I glance at the time and frown. It’s not even ten o’clock. After dress rehearsal, Lincoln Street Blues had a gig at Melville’s. Dad is never home until at least midnight on gig nights. “You’re home early.”

“Shorter set.” Dad’s delivery is casual until he sees my eyebrows shoot to the sky in concern. “It’s fine! It’s only until we find a replacement for Charlie. Turns out that without a keyboard, our repertoire is limited.”