I’m having a blast, really getting into the performance and realizing just how much I’ve missed this over the past five months. As we approach the chorus, I mentally prepare to unclip my long black dress and toss it behind me right as we go into the slide. We’ve practiced the move a million times, making sure we all do the costume change at the exact same moment, and that we toss our black dresses away with enough clearance so that nobody slips on the fabric (Jiyoon almost completely wiped out during practice once, Youngeun’s discarded dress playing the part of a banana peel under her feet). But by now, we’re pros. We could do it in our sleep. We’ve nailed it a thousand times in rehearsal, and now we’ll get to show off our hard work for the fans.

The moment comes, and I easily slip the hook out of the eye to reveal my dazzling violet sequined minidress underneath. I hear the audience gasp and cheer at the unexpected reveal. I easily toss my black dress behind me and slide, my right foot leading and my left foot trailing behind. I throw in a wink to the audience, just for fun, when suddenly—

Pain.

Blinding pain in my left foot.

I look down to see Eunji, on my left, slamming the spiky heel of her stiletto directly down on my left big toe. I let out a gasp of pain as I stumble, nearly crashing into Youngeun on my other side. Luckily, I right myself just in time, quickly falling back into formation, turning my gasp of pain into what hopefully looks to the audience like one of those Ooh! faces. As the rest of the dance goes on, my stage smile is frozen on my face, but my toe is hot and throbbing, and I have to blink fast to stop my eyes from watering with pain.

What the hell was that? Did Eunji do that on purpose?

I shoot a quick glance in her direction, but she’s smiling and dancing like nothing happened. Does she even know what she just did? She must. How could she not feel my foot under hers?

We finish the rest of our performance without any more accidents, striking our final pose to hoots and cheers from the audience. I look out at the sea of smiling faces, spotting the glowing Girls Forever light-up headbands that our +EVERs love to wear to our shows. For a moment, all the pain in my toe disappears, and I’m riding high on the joy of performing and making our fans so happy. But as we head backstage, the pain comes rushing back. And when I see Mr. Noh waiting for us, the pain doubles.

“Rachel, what was that?” he demands. “You missed your step and nearly fell flat on your face!”