I watch the tree moving with the rhythm of the wind. I sway in place, my legs itching for the stage again.

I’m so wide awake now that I abandon the idea of sleep altogether. Instead, I pull on the silk robe that matches the powder blue slip I’m wearing. Then I leave my room and wander aimlessly down the broad, empty corridors.

I keep seeing shapes in the walls, hearing footsteps following me through the halls. I keep feeling like someone is watching me.

I didn’t think I believed in ghosts. But if you don’t believe in something, you can’t possibly be scared of it, right? And right now, I’m absolutely on edge. So the math doesn’t add up.

I didn’t think it was possible for Adrian to come back from the dead. But he did. If that’s possible, then ghosts seem like the obvious next step.

The door of the ballroom is ajar when I approach it. It takes some effort to push it all the way open, but when it finally yields, it swings in without a sound and I slip through.

The mirrors greet me with a thousand versions of myself. I’m glowing in the darkness, what little light there is hitting my blue slip and making it shine. I run a hand over my growing baby bump, then twirl on the spot.

Halfway through my pirouette, I could swear I catch a shadow in the corner of my eye. I jerk to a halt and twist back around, but by the time I orient myself, the shadow has moved on.

“Maybe this place really is haunted,” I mutter under my breath.

I shake my head and tell myself to get it together. Ghosts aren’t real and Adrian was never actually dead. Right now, I have a ballroom to myself and music in my ears that only I can hear.

I start to sway, then to spin, then to let my arms go liquid and flowing. It takes me a moment to realize that the song I’m humming on my breath is the same sad tune that Kolya was playing one note at a time when we talked in his study the other day. The realization makes me shiver.

But I don’t question it. I just let it pick me up and carry me away. Before long, my muscles start to warm and my body starts to remember. Within minutes, I’ve fallen back into my old headspace. When dance was my language, and I could tell whole stories in the arch of my leg.

It feels good to do this. I can arabesque and ballonné; I can chaseé and echappé; I can be free and wild and beautiful.

I spy movement again in the corner and turn quickly. But this time, I’m not met with a shadow or a ghost.

This time, I’m met with over six feet of flesh and blood. And burning blue eyes that are as beautiful as they’re haunting.

“Jesus!” I gasp, stumbling back. I trip over my own feet and land on my ass on the hard marble floor.